title: Down-regulated MicroRNA 148b expression as predictive biomarker and its prognostic significance associated with clinicopathological features in non-small-cell lung cancer patients.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Lung cancer is most common and is the leading cause of cancer-related death in both men and women worldwide. Understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) development and progression are important. In the present study, we investigated the potential role of miR-148b expression analysis as potential lung cancer biomarker with the correlation of circulating miR-148b to clinicopathological features.
  
  
  METHODS
  A total of 104 NSCLC patients were diagnosed and cancer tissues together with adjacent normal tissues were evaluated. Quantitative Real-time PCR method was utilized to evaluate the expression levels of miR-148b. In addition, we investigated to clarify the relationship of miR-148b with clinicopathological features and survival in patients with NSCLC.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Our findings showed that miR-148b was downregulated in tumor tissues when compared with corresponding adjacent normal lung tissues (0.34 ± 0.13 vs. 1.00 ± 0.57, P < 0.05). Moreover decreased expression of miR-148b was significantly related to TNM stage (P = 0.001) and lymph node-metastasis (P = 0.023). This findings suggested that miR-148b was down-regulated in NSCLC patients and may play a key role as a tumor suppressor gene in NSCLC. Kaplan-Meier survival analysis and log-rank test suggested that low-expression group of patients had significantly shorter overall survival than high-expression group (log-rank test: P = 0.031). Multivariate Cox proportional hazards model analysis indicated that low miR-148b expression was independently linked to poor survival of patients with NSCLC (HR = 3.215, 95 % CI: 1.543-10.621, P = 0.021) and other factors were not significant independent predictor of survival in patients with NSCLC.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our findings demonstrated that miR-148b may play a role as independent prognostic factor for patients with NSCLC.
authors.affiliation: Brain and Spinal Injury Research Center, Neuroscience institute, Tehran University of Medical Science, Tehran, Iran.
authors.forename: Naeemeh
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Ghasemkhani
authors.affiliation: Brain and Spinal Injury Research Center, Neuroscience institute, Tehran University of Medical Science, Tehran, Iran.
authors.forename: Sahar
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Shadvar
authors.affiliation: Department of Biophysics, Faculty of Life Science, Azad University of Varamin Pishva Branch, Varamin, Iran.
authors.forename: Yasamin
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Masoudi
authors.affiliation: Department of Genetics, Faculty of Life Science, Azad University of Tehran Medical Sciences Branch, Tehran, Iran.
authors.forename: Amir Jouya
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Talaei
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular Biology, Baqiyatallah University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
authors.forename: Emad
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Yahaghi
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurosurgery, AJA University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Pedram_kg@yahoo.com.
authors.forename: Peyman Karimi
authors.initials: PK
authors.lastname: Goudarzi
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, Medical School, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran.
authors.forename: Ebrahim
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Shakiba
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor / Q000235:genetics*; D002289:Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung / Q000235:genetics / Q000401:mortality / Q000473:pathology*; D015536:Down-Regulation; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D053208:Kaplan-Meier Estimate; D008175:Lung Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics / Q000401:mortality / Q000473:pathology*; D008297:Male; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000032:analysis / Q000096:biosynthesis*; D008875:Middle Aged; D011379:Prognosis; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D060888:Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction
chemical_list: D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor; D035683:MicroRNAs