miRNAs在干细胞自我更新和分化中的调控作用

miRNAs play an essential role in stem cell self-renewal and differentiation

干细胞与microRNAs(miRNAs)均为近年来研究的热点问题。干细胞是一类具有自我更新与多项分化潜能的细胞,因与生物发育和癌症发生的密切联系而越来越受到人们的重视。miRNAs是一类长约22nt的小分子非编码RNA,具有高度的种间保守性和时空特异性,在转录后水平调节靶基因的表达,是细胞内基因表达的基本调控机制之一。最近的一些研究表明,miRNAs在干细胞的自我更新和分化过程中具有重要的调控作用。这些研究主要采用两种策略:(1)缺失/突变干细胞中miRNAs合成途径必需酶(包括Dicer1、Loqs、DGCR8、Argnaute蛋白等),通过细胞特性变化来研究其功能;(2)直接筛选干细胞中的特异性miRNAs并研究其功能。针对干细胞中miRNAs的研究对深入了解干细胞自我更新和分化的机制以及干细胞的鉴定具有重要的意义。文章基于近年来的研究对干细胞相关的miRNAs进行了综述。

Stem cells and miRNAs are two of the most intriguing research topics in recent years. Stem cells with properties of self-renewal and multipotency are remarkable cells since they play key roles in animal development and tumorigenesis, microRNAs （miRNAs） are -22nt non-coding RNAs, which have spatiotemporally specific expression patterns, and are highly conserved between species. Researchers have demonstrated that miRNAs can regulate gene expression at post-transcriptional level, and their action is one of the essential intracellular regulatory pathways. Recent evidence showed that miRNAs can regulate stem cells self-renewal and differentiation. The evidence mostly derived from the following research strategies： （1） deletion or mutation of the genes that encoding essential enzymes for miRNAs biogenesis, such as Dicerl, Loqs, DGCR8, and Argonaute; （2） screening of specific miRNAs from stem cells and investigation of their function. Comprehension of the miRNAs functions in stem cells is of great importance for further understanding their self-renewal and differentiation mechanism, as well as identification of stem cells. This paper reviews the potential roles of miRNAs in stem cellson the basis of recent researches.