MicroRNA与非小细胞肺癌

MicroRNA and non-small cell lung cancer

肺癌已经成为全球范围内因癌症导致死亡的首要原因,当今由于缺乏有效的指导临床诊断和治疗的肿瘤分子标志物,所以非小细胞肺癌患者的疗效不佳。Micro RNA(以下简称miRNA)是真核生物中一类长度约为22个核苷酸的参与基因转录后水平调控的小分子非编码RNA。miRNA在肺癌中发挥原癌基因及抑癌基因的作用,在肺癌的发生、发展过程中均发挥着重要作用。miRNA不仅可以在石蜡包埋组织和体液中保持稳定,而且在血清和血浆中也可以稳定存在,这个特性使循环miRNA有望成为一种新型分子标志物,为肺癌的早期分子诊断、预测预后及治疗效果开辟了一个新的研究领域。

Lung cancer has the highest world-wide cancer mortality. Current therapies for non-small cell lung cancer（NSCLC） patients are inefficient due to the lack of diagnostic and therapeutic markers. MicroRNAs （miRNAs） are a species of small non-coding single- stranded RNA of about 21 nucleotides that through partial sequence homology may interact with the 3＇ -untranslated region of target mRNA molecules. Recent evidence has shown that miRNA may function as tumor supressors or oncogenes, and alterations in miRNA expression may play a critical role in the initiation and progression of lung cancer, miRNAs are not only stable in paraffin embedded tissues and body fluids, but also in plasma and serum, which makes circulating miRNA a new kind of ideal biomarker that opens a new field for early molecular diagnosis of lung cancer, as well as for prediction of lung cancer survival and therapy.