Study of the antineoplastic effect of modulating apoptosis-related non-coding RNA in human hepatocellular carcinoma cell line (HepG2)

Abstract

Hepatocellular carcinoma, the predominant type of liver cancer, is one of the most prevalent primary malignant tumors and accounts for about 85-90% of all primary liver cancers. Worldwide, it is the fifth most common cancer and the second leading cause of cancer-related death. In Egypt, HCC represents 75% of malignant liver tumors as the incidence of HCC has doubled in the past 20 years.

Although HCC is not the most frequent cancer, its high mortality related to its low resectability rate, high recurrence after resection and poor response to conservative management causes a serious worldwide health burden with a mortality rate of 0.95 and 5 years survival of 6.9%. Thus, effective methods for the HCC patients’ early diagnosis and treatment are needed.

In the current study, we investigated the relationship between miR-421 and mRNA caspase-3 gene expression in HCC by examining cell proliferation after HepG2 cell line transfection with miR-421 mimic and inhibitor.

RT-qPCR was employed to detect expression of miR-421, Caspase-3 mRNA and lncRNA-CXADRP3, which were chosen according to bioinformatic analysis in HCC tis¬sues from 10 HCC patients, 5chronic hepatitis C cirrhotic tissue and 5 healthy normal liver tissue. Results showed that miR-421 expression in HCC tissues was high significant increase than in normal tissues (P<0.005). Also there was a high significant difference between HCC and