Long Non-Coding RNA-PAICC Promotes the Tumorigenesis of Human Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma by Increasing YAP1 Transcription

Intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC) is a heterogeneous hepatobiliary tumor with poor prognosis, lacking of reliable prognostic biomarkers and effective therapeutic targets. Long Noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) have been documented to be involved in various cancers progression. However, the role of lncRNAs in ICC remains largely unknown. In the present work, we used bioinformatics analysis to identify a number of lncRNAs that are differentially expressed in human ICC tissues. Among which, LncRNA-PAICC is found to be an independent prognostic marker in ICC. Moreover, lncRNA-PAICC promotes the proliferation and invasion of ICC cells. Mechanistically, lncRNA-PAICC acts as a competitive endogenous RNA (ceRNA) sponging the tumor suppressive microRNAs miR-141-3p and miR-27a-3p directly. And the competitive binding property is essential for lncRNA-PAICC to promote tumor growth and metastasis through activating the Hippo-YAP pathway. In summary, our results highlight the important role of lncRNA-PAICC-miR-141-3p/27a-3p-Yap1 axis in ICC, which will offer a novel perspective on the molecular pathogenesis and may serve as a potential target for antimetastatic molecular therapies of ICC.