Abstract 2114: Targeting c-Jun and c-Fos using microRNA's has a potential in contesting melanoma
Authors: Alhendi Ahmad M.N , Prado-Lourenço Leonel , Whitaker Noel 
Published: August 2015

Background and Aim:

MicroRNAs (miRNAs or miRs) are an abundant class of short (17 to 25 nt) non-coding single-stranded RNAs that are significant controllers of cellular gene expression. Mature miRNA is created from long primary genomic transcripts (pri-miRNA), which are processed in the nucleus. The resulting 60-80-nucleotide precursor miRNAs (pre-miRNAs) are transferred to the cytoplasm and are treated to produce a short RNA duplex. One strand of the duplex is degraded, the remaining single-stranded miRNA molecule associates with members of the Argonaute protein family, to form the RNA-induced silencing complex (RISC). RISC plus the guide miRNA bind to the 3′untranslated region (3′-UTR) of the targeted mRNA and induce gene down-regulation by mRNA cleavage or translational repression. Serum stimulation of cancer cells has been shown to prompt positive regulatory transcription factors, such as c-Jun, c-Fos and Egr-1, as well as increasing transcriptional repressors such as YY1, NAB2 and GCF2. These transcription factors play critical parts in the early stimulation of cancer disease phenotypes and are prime targets for clarifying disease pathways and as therapeutic candidates. The identification of microRNAs regulating the mRNAs of transcription factors will improve our understanding of the mechanism of disease gene stimulation and subsequent pathway initiation leading to cancer disease phenotypes. MicroRNAs that ablate disease phenotypes are possible pharmaceutical therapies. Our aim was to identify and profile microRNAs that interact with the mRNA of transcription factors such as c-Jun and c-Fos.

Results:

We measured the expresion of c-Jun and c-Fos at the mRNA and protein levels (time course 0 to 6 hrs) in MM200 (human melanoma). We measured the expression of two microRNAs, miR155 and miR125b, which have been reported as playing a role in regulating c-Jun and c-Fos in Dermal Fibroblasts and melanoma cells (Song, Liu et al. Cellular Physiology and Biochemistry 2012 and Kappelmann, Kuphal et al. Oncogene 2013). We show that miR-155 and miR-125b expression is repressed following serum activation in these two cell lines (HEK293 and MM200). Loss of function and gain-of-function studies in these cancer cell lines, by supressing and overexpressing miR155/125b were performed. Subsquently, a target 3′UTR vs microRNA study was conducted that demonstrated that the miR-155 and miR-125b have the ability to recognize and repress c-Jun and c-Fos. Moreover, phenotypic studies such as migration, proliferation, cell cycle were performed.

Conclusions:

miR-155 and miR-125b are able to regulate c-Jun and c-Fos mRNAs and to inhibit their expression at the protein level.

Citation Format: Ahmad M.N Alhendi, Leonel Prado-Lourenço, Noel Whitaker. Targeting c-Jun and c-Fos using microRNA's has a potential in contesting melanoma. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 106th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2015 Apr 18-22; Philadelphia, PA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2015;75(15 Suppl):Abstract nr 2114. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2015-2114