MiRNA-202-5p promotes Colorectal Carcinogenesis through suppression of PTEN

Jing Huang^1*, Yaqin Zhang^1*, Yuan Xu¹, Qi Xie², Shuang Wu¹, Yi Dong², Bing Chen², Yang Xia¹, Lili Guo¹, Qun Li¹, Hao Gu¹, Wanglai Hu^1,2✉

1. Department of Immunology, the school of Basic Medical Sciences, Anhui Medical University, Hefei, China, 230032.
2. Translational Research Institute, Henan Provincial People's Hospital, Molecular Pathology Center, Academy of Medical Science, Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou, China, 450003.
*These authors contributed equally to this work.

This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). See http://ivyspring.com/terms for full terms and conditions.

Citation:
Huang J, Zhang Y, Xu Y, Xie Q, Wu S, Dong Y, Chen B, Xia Y, Guo L, Li Q, Gu H, Hu W. MiRNA-202-5p promotes Colorectal Carcinogenesis through suppression of PTEN. J Cancer 2021; 12(11):3154-3163. doi:10.7150/jca.56186. Available from https://www.jcancer.org/v12p3154.htm

Abstract

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is still one of the leading causes of cancer-associated death in the modern society. The biological function of miR-202-5p for CRC development remains controversial, largely due to the fact that miR-202-5p can be tumor-suppressive or oncogenic in different contexts. Obtained results indicated that aberrant expression of miR-202-5p was observed in majority of human CRC samples and miR-202-5p was transcriptionally up-regulated by c-Myc. In addition, miR-202-5p functions to promote the activation of PI3K/Akt signaling pathway by directly suppressing PTEN. Silencing or enforced expression of miR-202-5p resulted in CRC cell proliferation inhibition and enhancement, respectively. Importantly, decreased PTEN level and increased phosphorylation of Akt were frequently associated with elevated miR-202-5p expression in colorectal cancer tissues. Increased miR-202-5p expression may serve as a tumor promoter by directly targeting PTEN in colorectal cancer.

Keywords: miR-202-5p, PTEN, c-Myc, CRC