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MicroRNA-30a suppresses breast tumor growth and metastasis by targeting metadherin

Oncogene volume 33, pages 3119–3128 (2014)Cite this article

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Abstract

Accumulating data have shown the involvement of microRNAs in cancerous processes as either oncogenes or tumor suppressor genes. Here, we established miR-30a as a tumor suppressor gene in breast cancer development and metastasis. Ectopic expression of miR-30a in breast cancer cell lines resulted in the suppression of cell growth and metastasis in vitro. Consistently, the xenograft mouse model also unveiled the suppressive effects of miR-30a on tumor growth and distal pulmonary metastasis. With dual luciferase reporter assay, we revealed that miR-30a could bind to the 3′-untranslated region of metadherin (MTDH) gene, thus exerting inhibitory effect on MTDH. Furthermore, we demonstrated that silence of MTDH could recapitulate the effects of miR-30a overexpression, while overexpression of MTDH could partially abrogate miR-30a-mediated suppression. Of significance, expression level of miR-30a was found to be significantly lower in primary breast cancer tissues than in the paired normal tissues. Further evaluation verified that miR-30a was negatively correlated with the extent of lymph node and lung metastasis in patients with breast cancer. Taken together, our findings indicated miR-30a inhibits breast cancer proliferation and metastasis by directly targeting MTDH, and miR-30a can serve as a prognostic marker for breast cancer. Manipulation of miR-30a may provide a promising therapeutic strategy for breast cancer treatment.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Shi Yan, Cunzhong Yuan and Ning Yang for collecting the clinical samples. This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (no. 30772133; no. 81072150; no. 81172529; no. 81272903) and Shandong Science and Technology Development Plan (no. 2012GZC22115).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Breast Surgery, Qilu Hospital, Shandong University, Jinan, China

    N Zhang, X Wang, Q Huo, M Sun, C Cai & Q Yang

  2. Institute of Cell Biology, Shandong University School of Medicine, Jinan, China

    Z Liu

  3. The Key Laboratory of Stem Cell Biology, Institute of Health Sciences, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China

    G Hu

  4. Key Laboratory of Experimental Teratology, Ministry of Education and Institute of Molecular Medicine and Genetics, Shandong University School of Medicine, Jinan, China

    Q Yang

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Zhang, N., Wang, X., Huo, Q. et al. MicroRNA-30a suppresses breast tumor growth and metastasis by targeting metadherin. Oncogene 33, 3119–3128 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/onc.2013.286

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