LncRNA16 is a potential biomarker for diagnosis of early-stage lung cancer that promotes cell proliferation by regulating the cell cycle

Abstract

Early diagnosis of lung cancer greatly reduces mortality; however, the lack of suitable plasma biomarkers presents a major obstacle. Recent studies showed that long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) played important roles in cancer initiation and development. Here, we identified differentially expressed lncRNAs in 20 lung cancer samples by using custom designed microarray and evaluated their expression in 118 lung cancer samples by real-time PCR (qRT-PCR). lncRNA16 (ENST00000539303) expression was significantly higher in lung cancer tissues (80/118) than in adjacent matched normal tissues. Importantly, this increase was similar to that in plasma (53/84) of lung cancer patients, including early stage. The role of lncRNA16 in lung cancer was studied in vitro and in vivo by using the lung cancer cell lines and xenograft mouse models. The results reveal that knockdown of lncRNA16 inhibited proliferation of PC9 cells in vitro and also inhibited tumor growth in xenograft mouse models. Overexpression of lncRNA16 promoted proliferation of A549 cells in vitro and also promoted tumor growth in xenograft mouse models. Specifically, we showed that lncRNA16 promoted G2/M transition by regulating cyclin B1 transcription. Together, our findings suggest that lncRNA16 is a promising biomarker suitable for early diagnosis of lung cancer, and a potential target for lung cancer treatment.

An Emerging Class of Long Non-coding RNA With Oncogenic Role Arises From the snoRNA Host Genes

“…In breast cancer, SNHG16 is positively associated with increased proliferation rate, apoptosis evasion, and cell cycle progression through ceRNA binding of miR-98, followed by E2F5 up-regulation (172). Moreover, this lncRNA also has the potential to become a biomarker of early-stage pulmonary malignancy, which is very difficult to diagnose with currently available methods (173). In ovarian cancer, SNHG16 increases malignant cell migration capacity through phosphorylationmediated activation of AKT (AKT serine/threonine kinase 1) and overexpression of MMP9 (174).…”

Long non‐coding RNA HOTAIR acts as a competing endogenous RNA to promote glioma progression by sponging miR‐126‐5p

“…Long non‐coding RNA (lncRNA) are a class of regulatory non‐coding RNAs molecules and are more than 200 nucleotides in length; they have been identified to play crucial roles in regulating gene expression during tumor progression (Chen et al, ; Li, Zhang, et al, ; Lv et al, ; Zhu et al, ). An increasing number of studies have shown that the aberrant expression of HOTAIR is associated with glioma genesis and that HOTAIR participates in different biological processes in glioma; for example, Zhang et al () reported that HOTAIR promotes glioblastoma cell cycle progression in an EZH2‐dependent manner.…”

LncRNA AK054921 and AK128652 are potential serum biomarkers and predictors of patient survival with alcoholic cirrhosis

“…LncRNA, metastasis-associated lung adenocarcinoma transcript 1 (MALAT1), was found to be a good predictor for HCC recurrence after liver transplantation 30 . lncRNA 16 (ENST00000539303) and Sox2 overlapping transcript (Sox2ot) were reported to be associated with prognosis in patients with lung and gastric cancers, respectively 31, 32 .…”