miRNAs in ovarian cancer: A systems approach (MAS5, plier, GCRMA)

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are short (~22 nucleotides) regulatory RNAs that can modulate gene expression and are aberrantly expressed in many diseases including cancer. Previous studies have shown that miRNAs inhibit the translation and facilitate the degradation of their targeted mRNAs making them attractive candidates for use in cancer therapy. However, the potential clinical utility of miRNAs in cancer therapy rests heavily upon our ability to understand and accurately predict the consequences of fluctuations in levels of miRNAs within the context of complex tumor cells. To evaluate the predictive power of current models, levels of miRNAs and their targeted messenger RNAs (mRNAs) were measured in laser captured micro-dissected (LCM) ovarian cancer epithelial cells (CEPI) and compared with levels present in ovarian surface epithelial cells (OSE). We found that the predicted inverse correlation between changes in levels of miRNAs and levels of their mRNA targets held for only ~6-11% of predicted target mRNAs. Our results underscore the complexities of miRNA-mediated regulation in vivo and caution against the widespread clinical application of miRNAs and miRNA inhibitors until the basis of these complexities is more fully understood.

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Shahab SW, Matyunina LV, Mezencev R, Walker LD, Bowen NJ, Benigno BB, McDonald JF