Upregulation of the Long Non-coding RNA PlncRNA-1 Promotes Esophageal Squamous Carcinoma Cell Proliferation and Correlates with Advanced Clinical Stage

• DOI: 10.1007/s10620-013-2956-7
• Publication Date: 2013-12-11T08:02:25Z
• Authors: Chun-Mei Wang; Qing-Quan Wu; Su-Qing Li; Fang-Jun Chen; Lei Tuo; Hai-Wei Xie; Yu-Suo Tong; Lv Ji; Guo-Zhi Zhou; Gang Cao; Ming Wu; Jin Lv; Wei-Hong Shi; Xiu-Feng Cao
• Keywords: Adult; Aged, 80 and over; Male; 0301 basic medicine; Esophageal Neoplasms; Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction; Apoptosis; Middle Aged; Flow Cytometry; Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction; 3. Good health; Gene Expression Regulation, Neoplastic; 03 medical and health sciences; Cell Line, Tumor; Gene Knockdown Techniques; Biomarkers, Tumor; Carcinoma, Squamous Cell; Humans; Female; RNA, Long Noncoding; Aged; Cell Proliferation; Neoplasm Staging

Recent studies revealed that long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) play critical regulatory roles in cancer biology. PlncRNA-1 is one of lncRNAs that is associated with cell apoptosis and proliferation of prostate cancer.This study aimed to assess the potential role of PlncRNA-1 in the pathogenesis of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC).Quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) was used to detect the expression level of PlncRNA-1 in 73 pairs of ESCC and their matched normal tissues. The correlation of PlncRNA-1 with clinicopathological features and clinical stages was also analyzed. Cancer cell proliferation and apoptosis were assessed following knock-down of PlncRNA-1 by MTT, colony formation assay, and flow cytometry.The expression of PlncRNA-1 was significantly higher in human ESCC compared with the adjacent noncancerous tissues (69.8 %, p < 0.05), and the high level of PlncRNA-1 expression was significantly correlated with advanced clinical stage (p < 0.01) and lymph node metastasis (p < 0.05). Furthermore, knockdown of PlncRNA-1 reduced cell proliferation and increased the apoptosis in vitro.PlncRNA-1 plays an important role in ESCC cell proliferation. Overexpression of PlncRNA-1 is correlated with advanced tumor stage and lymph node metastasis, and may serve as a potential prognostic marker and therapeutic target for ESCC.