Digestive tumors have the highest incidence among all tumor types worldwide. miR-146a has been shown to play an important role in the development, apoptosis, invasion and metastasis of digestive tumors. Additionally, a miR-146a gene polymorphism has been associated with the risk of a variety of cancer types in the digestive system. Therefore, in order to investigate the correlation, a meta-anal...

The aberrant immunity plays an important role in the pathogenesis of allergic diseases. Micro RNAs (miR) are involved in regulating the immunity in the body. This study aims to test a hypothesis that miR-146a induces the expression of interleukin (IL)-10 in monocytes (Mos). In this study, the levels of miR-146a were determined by real time RT-PCR. The IL-10(+) Mos were evaluated by flow cytomet...

BACKGROUND Although the curative rate for acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) has been improved over decades, long-term prognosis is still poor. The genetic pathways that regulated cell lineage fate during the development of APL remain unclear. METHODS We investigated the correlations of miR-146a expression with its target gene Smad4 and the biological behaviors of NB4 cells. We also analyzed ...

A number of microRNAs (miRs) have been shown to participate in the regulation of vascular smooth muscle cell (VSMC) proliferation, a key step in the formation of atherosclerotic plaque, by targeting certain genes. The aim of the present study was to investigate the roles of miR‑146a and miR‑21 in VSMC growth and to study the underlying mechanisms. The expression levels of four previously report...

BACKGROUND The morbidity of erectile dysfunction (ED) has been found to be substantially increased in patients with chronic prostatitis (CP). Accumulating evidence shows that single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) located in pre-miRNA or mature microRNA may affect the processing of microRNA (miRNA) and alter the expression of the miRNA, as well as its target gene. In this study we investigated th...

Langerhans cells (LCs) in epithelia and interstitial dendritic cells (intDCs) in adjacent connective tissues represent two closely related myeloid-derived DC subsets that exert specialized functions in the immune system and are of clinical relevance for cell therapy. Both subsets arise from monocyte-committed intermediates in response to tissue-associated microenvironmental signals; however, mo...

The growth of endogenous collateral arteries that bypass arterial occlusion(s), or arteriogenesis, is a fundamental shear stress-induced adaptation with implications for treating peripheral arterial disease. MicroRNAs (miRs) are key regulators of gene expression in response to injury and have strong therapeutic potential. In a previous study, we identified miR-146a as a candidate regulator of v...

Huntington's disease (HD) is caused by the expansion of N-terminal polymorphic poly Q stretch of the protein huntingtin (HTT). Deregulated microRNAs and loss of function of transcription factors recruited to mutant HTT aggregates could cause characteristic transcriptional deregulation associated with HD. We observed earlier that expressions of miR-125b, miR-146a and miR-150 are decreased in STH...

The properties of stem cells can be induced during the epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT). The responsible molecular mechanisms, however, remain largely undefined. Here we report the identification of the microRNA-146a (miR-146a) as a common target of Krüppel-like factor 8 (KLF8) and TGF-β, both of which are known EMT-inducers. Upon KLF8 overexpression or TGF-β treatment, a significant ...

A G to C polymorphism (rs2910164) is located within the sequence of miR-146a precursor, which leads to a change from a G:U pair to a C:U mismatch in its stem region. The predicted miR-146a target genes include BRCA1 and BRCA2, which are key breast and ovarian cancer genes. To examine whether rs2910164 plays any role in breast and/or ovarian cancer, we studied associations between this polymorph...