MicroRNA-98 suppresses cell proliferation, migration and invasion by targeting collagen triple helix repeat containing 1 in hepatocellular carcinoma.

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are emerging as critical regulators in carcinogenesis and tumor progression. miR-98 has previously been verified to be important in tumor progression, however, its function in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) remains to be elucidated. The expression levels of miR-98 in HCC tissues and cell lines were determined by reverse transcription quantitative polymerase chain reaction. Subsequently, the effect of miR-98 on cell proliferation, migration and invasion was evaluated by MTT assay, transwell migration assay and transwell invasion assay. Furthermore, a luciferase reporter assay was conducted to confirm the action of miR-98 on downstream target genes, including collagen triple helix repeat containing 1 (CTHRC1). In the present study, it was confirmed that miR-98 was significantly downregulated in HCC tissues and cell lines. Overexpression of miR-98 inhibited HCC cell proliferation, migration and invasion in vitro. In addition, at the molecular level, the tumor oncogene CTHRC1 was identified to be the direct target of miR-98. Our findings suggested that miR-98 was significantly downregulated in HCC and suppressed HCC cell proliferation, migration and invasion partially via the downregulation of CTHRC1. Thus, these data demonstrated that miR-98 could be a potential therapeutic target in HCC.