Open Access

ARTICLE

MicroRNA-139-3p Suppresses Tumor Growth and Metastasis in Hepatocellular Carcinoma by Repressing ANXA2R

Zeng Cheng Zou^*1, Min Dai^*1, Zeng Yin Huang^†, Yi Lu^‡, He Ping Xie^*, Yi Fang Li^§, Yue Li^*, Ying Tan^¶, Feng Lin Wang^*

* Department of Integrated Traditional and Western Medicine, The Third Affiliated Hospital of SunYat-sen University, Guangzhou, P.R. China
† Department of Oncology Guangdong Provincial Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Guangzhou, P.R. China
‡ Department of Hepatobiliary Surgery, The Third Affiliated Hospital of SunYat-sen University, Guangzhou, P.R. China
§ Department of Acupuncture, Guangdong Provincial Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Guangzhou, P.R. China
¶ Department of Infertility and Sterility, Guangdong Provincial Family Planning Research Institute, Guangzhou, P.R. China
1 These authors provided equal contribution to this work and are co-first authors.

Oncology Research 2018, 26(9), 1391-1399. https://doi.org/10.3727/096504018X15178798885361

Abstract

The direct roles of miR-139-3p on hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) cell growth and metastasis remain poorly understood. We attempted to demonstrate the regulatory role of miR-139-3p in HCC progression and its underlying mechanisms. Here we showed that miR-139-3p expression was significantly reduced in the HCC tissues compared to paratumor tissues. Exogenous overexpression of miR-139-3p inhibited the migration and invasion of HCC cells, whereas downregulation of miR-139-3p was able to induce HCC HepG2 and SNU-449 cell migration and invasion. In addition, miR-139-3p inhibited HCC growth and lung metastasis in an in vivo mouse model, which is mainly regulated by annexin A2 receptor (ANXA2R). Finally, we identified that the expression of miR-139-3p was inversely correlated with ANXA2R expression in human HCC tissue. All these results demonstrated that miR-139-3p inhibited the metastasis process in HCC by downregulating ANXA2R expression.

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Keywords

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