title: Overexpression of miR-221 is associated with aggressive clinicopathologic characteristics and the BRAF mutation in papillary thyroid carcinomas.
abstract: Correlation between clinicopathogenetic features and the expression of specific miRNAs is unclear in papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC). We therefore sought to assess whether miR-221 was associated with aggressive clinicopathologic characteristics and the BRAF mutation. We studied the expression levels of miR-221 using northern blot quantitated by scion image in 51 cases of PTCs. The status of BRAF of PTCs was analyzed through direct DNA sequencing. Mann-Whitney U test was used to analyze different expression of miR-221 in PTCs with distinct clinicopathogenetic characteristics including gender, age, tumor size, multifocality, extrathyroidal invasion, disease stages, node metastasis, and BRAF status. Compared with the normal thyroid tissues, the relative expression of miR-221 in tumor tissues was significantly upregulated (p < 0.001). Overexpression of miR-221 was significantly associated with extrathyroidal invasion (p = 0.001), lymph node metastasis (p = 0.046), advanced disease stages III-IV (p = 0.001), and the BRAF mutation (p = 0.014). While among BRAF wild tumors, miR-221 was only associated with extarthyroidal invasion, it showed strong association with all above aggressive features among BRAF mutation tumors. MiR-221 may be of potential importance in determining the aggressive properties of PTCs including the BRAF mutation, and it may further refine the risk stratification by BRAF mutation in PTCs.
authors.affiliation: Department of Oncology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Wenzhou Medical College, No. 2 Fuxue Lane, Wenzhou, Zhejiang, China.
authors.forename: Yi-Li
authors.initials: YL
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.forename: Chao
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Xuan-xuan
authors.initials: XX
authors.lastname: Dai
authors.forename: Xiao-Hua
authors.initials: XH
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Ou-Chen
authors.initials: OC
authors.lastname: Wang
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D015152:Blotting, Northern; D002277:Carcinoma / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology*; D002291:Carcinoma, Papillary; D004252:DNA Mutational Analysis; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000235:genetics*; D008875:Middle Aged; D009154:Mutation; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D048493:Proto-Oncogene Proteins B-raf / Q000235:genetics*; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction; D000077273:Thyroid Cancer, Papillary; D013964:Thyroid Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology*; D055815:Young Adult
chemical_list: D035683:MicroRNAs; D048493:Proto-Oncogene Proteins B-raf; C525709:MIR221, human; C482119:BRAF protein, human