JPHYD Inhibits miR-21-5p/Smad7-Mediated Epithelial-Mesenchymal Transition of Hepatocellular Carcinoma Cells.

Background: Studies have shown that Jianpi Huayu Decoction (JPHYD) can inhibit the growth of hepatocellular carcinoma cells, but the mechanism of its effect was not clear at present. Methods: We assessed the effect of JPHYD using liver cancer cells as in vitro cell model and xenograft tumor as in vivo model. CCK8, EdU, wound-healing, and transwell assays were performed to assess the cell growth, migration, and invasion of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) cell lines HepG2 and MHCC97H. Western blot assay was performed to observe the protein level of E-cadherin, Smad7, N-cadherin, Snail, Smad3, Vimentin, and Zeb1. qRT-PCR assay was used to observe the expression of miR-21-5p in clinical liver cancer tissue samples and in HepG2 and MHCC97H cells. Animal tumorigenesis experiments and in vivo imaging experiments were performed to assess the results of in vitro experiments. Results: We found that JPHYD could inhibit the proliferation, invasion, and migration of hepatocellular carcinoma cells and JPHYD decreased the level of N-cadherin, Snail, Vimentin, Smad3, and Zeb1 and increased E-cadherin and Smad7 proteins. The expression of miR-21-5p was increased while that protein of Smad7 was decreased in HCC tissues. The vivo experiments also showed that miR-21-5p could promote the migration of HCC cells. JPHYD decreased miR-21-5p expression. The same results have been found in animal studies. Conclusion: Our results indicated that JPHYD inhibited epithelial-mesenchymal transition by increasing Smad7 expression and inhibiting miR-21-5p. Therefore, blocking the occurrence and development of EMT may be a new mechanism of JPHYD's anti-liver cancer effect.

Dysregulation of MALAT1 and miR-619-5p as a prognostic indicator in advanced colorectal carcinoma.

The present study aimed to detect the expression of metastasis associated lung adenocarcinoma transcript 1 (MALAT1) and microRNA (miR)-619-5p in colorectal carcinoma (CRC), and to evaluate the significance of MALAT1 and miR-619-5p expression in the clinical diagnosis and prognosis of CRC. Quantitative polymerase chain reaction was used to detect MALAT1 and miR-619-5p expression in 120 colorectal carcinoma and 120 adjacent normal tissue samples. The expression levels of MALAT1 and miR-619-5p were significantly different between colorectal carcinoma and adjacent normal tissues (P<0.05). MALAT1 exhibited an average 2.52-fold increase in colorectal adenoma when compared with adjacent normal tissues, while miR-619-5p exhibited an average 5.79-fold decrease in colorectal adenoma when compared with adjacent normal tissues. There was a significant difference between the MALAT1 expression in CRC tissues obtained from men and women (P=0.027), and in tumor-node-metastasis (TNM) stage II and stage III lesions (P=0.019). MALAT1 expression was associated with lymphovascular invasion (P=0.047) and perineural invasion (P=0.012). In addition, miR-619-5p expression was also significantly different between men and women (P=0.032), and between TNM stage II and stage III lesions (P=0.012). miR-619-5p expression was also associated with lymphovascular invasion (P=0.023) and perineural invasion (P=0.009). Patients with high expression of MALAT1 and low expression of miR-619-5p demonstrated significantly shorter disease-free survival (DFS) (P=0.002) and overall survival (OS) times (P=0.004) compared with patients with low MALAT1 expression and high miR-619-5p expression. Patients with perineural invasion demonstrated significantly shorter DFS (P=0.001) and OS times (P=0.003) compared with patients without perineural invasion. In addition, there was a negative correlation between MALAT1 expression and miR-619-5p expression (r=-0.415, P=0.004) in CRC tissues. In conclusion, MALAT1 and miR-619-5p have potential for the molecular diagnosis of CRC patients, and combined assaying of MALAT1 and miR-619-5p may improve the accuracy of the diagnosis of CRC and act as a good prognostic indicator in CRC patients.

Systematic Analysis of Icotinib Treatment for Patients with Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer.

PURPOSE: This analysis was conducted to evaluate the efficacy and safety of icotinib based regimens in treating patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). METHODS: Clinical studies evaluating the efficacy and safety of icotinib-based regimens with regard to response and safety for patients with NSCLC were identified using a predefined search strategy. Pooled response rates of treatment were calculated. RESULTS: With icotinib-based regimens, 7 clinical studies which including 5,985 Chinese patients with NSCLC were considered eligible for inclusion. The pooled analysis suggested that, in all patients, the positive reponse rate was 30.1% (1,803/5,985) with icotinib-based regimens. Mild skin itching, rashes and diarrhea were the main side effects. No grade III or IV renal or liver toxicity was observed. No treatment-related death occurred in patients treated with icotinib-based regimens. CONCLUSIONS: This evidence based analysis suggests that icotinib based regimens are associated with mild response rate and acceptable toxicity for treating Chinese patients with NSCLC.

[Clinical analysis of intracytoplasmic sperm injection in patients with previous fertilization failure after conventional IVF].

OBJECTIVE: To analyze the clinical outcome of intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) in patients with previous fertilization failure after conventional IVF. METHODS: Data from 20 ICSI cases (22 ICSI cycles) with previous complete failure of fertilization or with fertilization rate < or = 20% between January 2002 and December 2004 were retrospectively analyzed. The control group consisted of 100 consecutive ICSI cycles for male factor infertility in the same period. RESULTS: The fertilization rate dramatically increased from 5.4% after conventional IVF to 76.9% after ICSI treatment (chi-squared = 264.66, P < 0.001). However, the fertilization rate in the subgroup with previous low fertilization was significantly lower than those in the control and in the subgroup without previous fertilization (67.9% vs 77.5%, 67.9% vs 84.2%). Compared with the control group, the subgroup without previous fertilization had a higher pregnancy rate and implantation rate, but only the difference in the implantation rate was statistically significant (40.5% vs 18.9%). CONCLUSION: ICSI can overcome previous fertilization failure with conventional in vitro fertilization and thus improve the clinical outcome.