Abstract
Since their discovery and the advent of RNA interference, microRNAs have drawn enormous attention because of their ubiquitous involvement in cellular pathways from life to death, from metabolism to communication. It is also widely accepted that they possess an undeniable role in cancer both as tumor suppressors and tumor promoters modulating cell proliferation and migration, epithelial-mesenchymal transition and tumor cell invasion and metastasis. Moreover, microRNAs can even affect the tumor surrounding environment influencing angiogenesis and immune system activation and recruitment. The tight association of microRNAs with several cancer-related processes makes them undoubtedly connected to the effect of specific cancer drugs inducing either resistance or sensitization. In this context, personalized medicine through microRNAs arose recently with the discovery of single nucleotide polymorphisms in the target binding sites, in the sequence of the microRNA itself or in microRNA biogenesis related genes, increasing risk, susceptibility and progression of multiple types of cancer in different sets of the population. The depicted scenario implies that the overall variation displayed by these small non-coding RNAs have an impact on patient-specific pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of cancer drugs, pushing on a rising need of personalized treatment. Indeed, microRNAs from either tissues or liquid biopsies are also extensively studied as valuable biomarkers for disease early recognition, progression and prognosis. Despite microRNAs being intensively studied in recent years, a comprehensive review describing these topics all in one is missing. Here we report an up-to-date and critical summary of microRNAs as tools for better understanding personalized cancer biogenesis, evolution, diagnosis and treatment.
Highlights
Specialty section: This article was submitted to Molecular and Cellular Oncology, a section of the journal Frontiers in Cell and Developmental
The depicted scenario implies that the overall variation displayed by these small non-coding RNAs have an impact on patient-specific pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of cancer drugs, pushing on a rising need of personalized treatment
As described in the previous paragraphs, microRNAs have some advantages as high specificity, sensitivity, and classification power, which can be exploited for cancer personalized medicine
Summary
Specialty section: This article was submitted to Molecular and Cellular Oncology, a section of the journal Frontiers in Cell and Developmental. Another study revealed that miR-187 expression was significantly increased in NSCLC tissue samples compared to adjacent non-lung tumor tissues and that this condition associated with TNM classification and shorter OS (Peng et al, 2016). In both cases the studies agree with what occurs in lung cancer, where low miR-187 level of expression is associated with poor patient survival.
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