Abstract
Resveratrol (trans-3,5,4′-trihydroxystilbene, RSV) is a non-flavonoid dietary polyphenol with antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer properties that is primarily found in red berries. While RSV displays many beneficial effects in vitro, its actual effects in vivo or in animal models remain passionately debated. Recent publications suggest that RSV pleiotropic effects could arise from its capability to regulate the expression and activity of microRNAs, short regulators themselves capable of regulating up to several hundreds of target genes. In particular, RSV increases microRNA miR-663 expression in different human cell lines, suggesting that at least some of its multiple beneficial properties are through the modulation of expression of this microRNA. Indeed, the expression of microRNA miR-663 is reduced in certain cancers where miR-663 is considered to act as a tumor suppressor gene, as well as in other pathologies such as cardiovascular disorders. Target of miR-663 include genes involved in tumor initiation and/or progression as well as genes involved in pathologies associated with chronic inflammation. Here, we review the direct and indirect effects of RSV on the expression of miR-663 and its target transcripts, with emphasise on TGFβ1, and their expected health benefits, and argue that elucidating the molecular effects of different classes of natural compounds on the expression of microRNAs should help to identify new therapeutic targets and design new treatments.
Highlights
Recent years have brought an increasing number of publications describing the potentials of plant natural products to be used for the treatment of human pathologies
The literature analyzed here above clearly demonstrates that it goes for microRNAs as it goes for coding genes: none of them is just only detrimental, none of them is capable of producing beneficial effects in all circumstances
While miR-663 has been several times described as a “bad” microRNA, it seems capable to deliver tumor-suppressive effects and to prevent vascular smooth muscular cell phenotypic switch that is associated with arterial injury
Summary
Recent years have brought an increasing number of publications describing the potentials of plant natural products to be used for the treatment of human pathologies. Based on studies conducted in animal models such as swine, mouse or monkeys, the absorption of regular, low doses of RSV seems to bear promising potentials for preventive therapeutics [6]. Transferring these results in human, remains challenging, in particular when it comes to measuring RSV protecting effects in healthy subjects, given in particular the impossibility of conducting long or very long-term studies, that, beyond considerable cost, carry high risks of bias [6]. MicroRNAs have been progressively implicated in all aspects of cell biology and homeostasis and established as key players in a number of pathologies, including, but not limited to, inflammatory, metabolic and cardiovascular diseases, neuropathologies, and cancers [14,15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25,26]
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