LncRNA-SVUGP2 suppresses progression of hepatocellular carcinoma

// Jiangfeng Hu 1, * , Chenlin Song 2, * , Bensong Duan 1, * , Xiaoyan Zhang 3 , Dongliang Li 4 , Liang Zhu 5 and Hengjun Gao 6, 7 1 Department of Gastroenterology, Tongji Hospital, Tongji University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China 2 Division of Molecular Biology of the Cell II, German Cancer Research Center, DKFZ-ZMBH Alliance, Heidelberg, Germany 3 Shanghai Engineering Center for Molecular Medicine, National Engineering Center for Biochip at Shanghai, Shanghai, China 4 Department of Hepatobiliary Medicine, Fuzhou General Hospital of Nanjing Command, PLA, Fuzhou, China 5 Department of Gastroenterology, Changzheng Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, China 6 National Engineering Center for Biochip at Shanghai, Shanghai, China 7 Department of Gastroenterology, Institute of Digestive Diseases, Tongji University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China * These authors contributed equally to this work Correspondence to: Hengjun Gao, email: hengjun_gao@tongji.edu.cn Dongliang Li, email: dongliangli93@163.com Liang Zhu, email: zhuliangcz@126.com Keywords: lncRNA-SVUGP2, hepatocellular carcinoma, proliferation, invasion, liver Received: March 06, 2017 Accepted: April 25, 2017 Published: May 29, 2017 ABSTRACT Numerous studies indicate that long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) are dysregulated in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and might serve as potential diagnostic biomarkers and therapeutic targets of HCC. Therefore, it is interesting to globally identify the lncRNAs altered in HCC. In our study, we used microarray to profile the levels of lncRNAs and mRNAs in three pairs of HCC and their adjacent noncancerous samples. We found lncRNA-SVUGP2, which is a splice variant of the UGP2 gene, was down-regulated in HCC samples and correlates with a better prognosis in patients with HCC. Overexpression of lncRNA-SVUGP2 in HepG2 and Hep3B liver cancer cells suppresses cell proliferation in vitro and tumor growth in vivo . Moreover, lncRNA-SVUGP2 suppresses the invasion ability of liver cancer cell lines and downregulates the mRNA and protein levels of MMP2 and 9. Additionally, lncRNA-SVUGP2 positively or negatively correlates with many mRNAs in liver cancer tissues, indicating it is multifunctional in regulating carcinogenesis.