Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2014 May 21:1:21-33.
doi: 10.2147/JHC.S44463. eCollection 2014.

Micro-ribonucleic acids: potential noninvasive biomarkers for hepatocellular carcinoma

Limin Li  1 , Wenli Diao  1 , Ke Zen  1
Affiliations
Review

Micro-ribonucleic acids: potential noninvasive biomarkers for hepatocellular carcinoma

Limin Li et al. J Hepatocell Carcinoma. .

Abstract

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is one of the most common malignancies globally. Each year, more than 500,000 people worldwide are diagnosed with HCC. The onset of HCC is typically unnoticeable, and the prognosis is usually poor. The early diagnosis of HCC and dynamic monitoring of this disease can contribute to more effective therapeutic interventions and improve patient outcomes. To achieve early diagnosis, more sensitive, specific, and easily detectable biomarkers are necessary. Recently, scientists have focused on identifying novel, sensitive, and minimally invasive or noninvasive biomarkers. Micro-ribonucleic acids (miRNAs) are a class of endogenous noncoding single-stranded RNAs that regulate gene expression at the posttranscriptional level. By negatively regulating target-gene expression, miRNAs play a critical role in diverse biological processes, including apoptosis, proliferation, differentiation, and developmental timing. Unique changes in miRNA expression in serum or plasma samples from HCC patients have been reported, suggesting that miRNAs may serve as novel noninvasive biomarkers for diagnosing HCC and evaluating therapeutic responses or as potential therapeutic targets in HCC. This review focuses on recent progress in understanding the role of miRNAs in HCC pathogenesis and progression, and highlights their diagnostic and prognostic value for HCC patients.

Keywords: biomarker; diagnosis; hepatocellular carcinoma; miRNA; prognosis.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
The biogenesis of micro-ribonucleic acids (miRNAs). Primary miRNAs (pri-miRNAs) are transcribed from miRNAs encoding genes by polymerase (pol) II and processed into precursor miRNA (pre-miRNA) by Drosha in the nucleus. Pre-miRNAs are next exported to the cytoplasm with the help of exportin 5 and processed into mature form by Dicer. miRNAs in cytoplasm can bind to complementary sequences on target messenger RNAs to repress translation or trigger messenger RNA cleavage. Abbreviations: ORF, open-reading frame; mRNA, messenger RNA; RISC, RNA-induced silencing complex.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

References

    1. Qi J, Wang J, Katayama H, Sen S, Liu SM. Circulating microRNAs (cmiRNAs) as novel potential biomarkers for hepatocellular carcinoma. Neoplasma. 2013;60(2):135–142. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Kim DY, Han KH. Epidemiology and surveillance of hepatocellular carcinoma. Liver Cancer. 2012;1(1):2–14. - PMC - PubMed
    1. El-Serag HB. Epidemiology of hepatocellular carcinoma in USA. Hepatol Res. 2007;37(Suppl 2):S88–S94. - PubMed
    1. El-Serag HB, Rudolph KL. Hepatocellular carcinoma: epidemiology and molecular carcinogenesis. Gastroenterology. 2007;132(7):2557–2576. - PubMed
    1. Nishioka K, Levin AG, Simons MJ. Hepatitis B antigen, antigen subtypes, and hepatitis B antibody in normal subjects and patients with liver disease. Bull World Health Organ. 1975;52(3):293–300. - PMC - PubMed