Title: LncRNA BCAR4 promotes colon cancer progression via activating Wnt/β-catenin signaling
Abstract: // Shurui Ouyang 1 , Xinbin Zheng 1 , Xin Zhou 1 , Zhengquan Chen 1 , Xuefeng Yang 1 and Ming Xie 1 1 Gastrointestinal Department, Affiliated Hospital of Zunyi Medical College, Guizhou 563000, China Correspondence to: Ming Xie, email: [email protected] Keywords: BCAR4, colon cancer, proliferation, Wnt/β-catenin Received: August 01, 2017 Accepted: September 04, 2017 Published: October 06, 2017 ABSTRACT BCAR4 (Breast Cancer Anti-Estrogen Resistance 4) is a long noncoding RNA that was identified as an oncogene in breast cancer. In our research, we found that the expression level of BCAR4 was upregulated in colon cancer tissues compared to paired normal tissues. What’s more, higher BCAR4 expression was correlated with lower survival rate in patients with colon cancer. Mechanistically, we showed that BCAR4 activated Wnt/β-catenin signaling in colon cancer by protecting β-catenin from degradation. We also showed that BCAR4 overexpression promoted cell proliferation and migration in colon cancer. However, silencing BCAR4 inhibited cell growth and promoted apoptosis. Besides, BCAR4 knockdown decreased tumor growth in vivo . These findings indicate that BCAR4 facilitated colon cancer progression by enhancing cell proliferation and inhibiting apoptosis via BCAR4/β-catenin axis. BCAR4 may be a useful new target for treatment of patients with colon cancer.