Posttranscriptional regulation of Galectin-3 by miR-128 contributes to colorectal cancer progression

Abstract

// Weiqun Lu 1, * , Jia Wang 1, * , Guohua Yang 1 , Nanrong Yu 1 , Zhiliang Huang 1 , Houwei Xu 1 , Jianchang Li 1 , Jiliang Qiu 1 , Xiang Zeng 1 , Shicai Chen 1 , Nan Li 1 , Haiying Liu 1 1 Department of Gastrointestinal Neoplasms Surgery, Affiliated Cancer Hospital & Institute of Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou 510095, Guangdong, China * These authors contributed equally to this work Correspondence to: Nan Li, email: linan_gz2013@163.com Haiying Liu, email: gzdlhy@sina.com Keywords: colorectal cancer, Galectin-3, miR-128, cancer progression Received: December 06, 2016      Accepted: January 17, 2017      Published: January 27, 2017 ABSTRACT Here we demonstrated that Galectin-3 protein level was frequently up-regulated in colorectal cancer (CRC) cells and tissues. Galectin-3 up-regulation correlated with CRC progression and predicted a shorter overall survival of CRC patients. Galectin-3 overexpression attenuated the chemo-sensitivity of cancer cells, but enhanced the potential invasiveness. To explore the mechanism for Galectin-3 dysregulation, we found that miR-128 level was frequently down-regulated in CRC and negatively correlated with Galectin-3 level. Using bioinformatics analysis and experimental validation, we showed that miR-128 could directly target Galectin-3 to repress its protein level. MiR-128 decrease associated with CRC progression and predicted a worse overall survival of CRC patients. Ectopic miR-128 expression enhanced the chemo-sensitivity of CRC cells in vitro and in vivo , and inhibited the potential invasiveness. Galectin-3 expression impaired the cancer suppressive effects of miR-128. These data highlighted the role of miR-128/Galectin-3 axis in colorectal cancer.