Author(s)

Fangfang Jiang¹, Qiaoyun Huang², Jiexiang Nian², Shenghui Yang³

¹Department of Stomatology, Jining No. 1 People’s Hospital, Jining, China.
²State Key Laboratory of Agricultural Microbiology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, China.
³Nong Bo Jun She Bio-Technology Co., Ltd., Jining, China.

Background: To investigate the therapeutic activity of the miR-221/222 inhibitor against OSCC in vitro and in vivo. Materials and Methods: HSC3 and HSC6 were treated with miR-221/222 inhibitor and the empty vector respectively. After the recombinants were transfected into HSC3 and HSC6 with Lipofectamine^TM MAX, the expression of miR-221/222 and PUMA was analyzed by RT-PCR. The proliferation and migration of HSC3 and HSC6 were detected by CCK-8 assay and Wound-healing assay. Cell cycle and apoptosis were detected by flow cytometry. The effect of the miR-221/222 inhibitor was also assessed in OSCC xenografts in BALB/c-nu mice. Results: Transfection of the miR-221/222 inhibitor increased cell apoptosis and upregulated PUMA expression in OSCC cell lines HSC3 and HSC6 with the significantly reduced expression of miR-221 and miR-222. Furthermore, the miR-221/222 inhibitor suppressed cell growth and invasion and blocked the cell cycle at the G1 phase. Obvious anti-tumor activity was achieved in BALB/c-nu mice by treatment with the miR-221/222 inhibitor, together with the upregulation of PUMA protein in tumors retrieved from the mice. Conclusions: There was a significant inhibitory effect of the miR-221/222 inhibitor on the growth of OSCC both in vitro and in vivo, and there might be a regulatory loop between miR-221/222 and PUMA. These findings demonstrated that downregulation of miR-221/222 could induce cell apoptosis, and it might be considered as a candidate target for gene therapy of OSCC.

miR-221/222, Apoptosis, Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma, PUMA, Target

Jiang, F. , Huang, Q. , Nian, J. and Yang, S. (2023) miR-221/222/PUMA Axis Promotes Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma Apoptosis. Open Journal of Stomatology, 13, 367-383. doi: 10.4236/ojst.2023.1310030.