Objective: To investigate the expression level of TUG1 and one of its transcript variants (n377360) in osteosarcoma cells and assess the role of TUG1 in proliferation and apoptosis in the U2OS cell line. Methods: TUG1 and n377360 expression levels in patients with osteosarcomas and the U2OS human osteosarcoma cell line were evaluated using real-time quantitative PCR. U2OS cells were transected with TUG1 and n377360 siRNA or non-targeting siRNA. MTS was performed to assess the cell proliferation and flow cytometry was applied to analyze apoptosis. Results: We found significantly higher TUG1 and n377360 expression levels in osteosarcoma tissues compared with matched non-tumorous tissues. In line with this, suppression of TUG1 and n377360 expression by siRNA significantly impaired the cell proliferation potential of osteosarcoma cells. Furthermore, inhibition of TUG1 expression significantly promoted osteosarcoma cell apoptosis. Conclusions: The overexpression of TUG1 and n377360 in osteosarcoma specimens and the functional role of TUG1 and n377360 regarding cell proliferation and apoptosis in an osteosarcoma cell line provided evidence that the use of TUG1 or n377360 may be a viable but an as yet unexplored therapeutic strategy in tumors that over express these factors.

Significance Failure of the host immune system to control infection with Mycobacterium tuberculosis is a major determinant of tuberculosis (TB) disease. In this work, we examined the role of macrophage migration inhibitory factor (MIF), a cytokine that is encoded in a functionally polymorphic locus in humans, in TB. We found genetic low expressers of MIF to be enriched in a population of patients with HIV and disseminated TB. From our work in cellular and mouse models, we propose a key mechanism by which MIF regulates bacterial recognition as the first step in triggering inflammatory pathways to enable mycobacterial control.

Growing number of long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) are emerging as new modulators in cancer origination and progression. A lncRNA, ADAM metallopeptidase with thrombospondin type 1 motif, 9 (ADAMTS9) antisense RNA 2 (ADAMTS9-AS2), with unknown function, is the antisense transcript of tumor suppressor ADAMTS9. In the present study, we investigated the expression pattern and functional role of ADAMTS9-AS2 in glioma by using real-time PCR and gain-/loss-of-function studies. The results showed that the ADAMTS9-AS2 expression was significantly downregulated in tumor tissues compared with normal tissues and reversely associated with tumor grade and prognosis. Multivariate analysis of the prognosis factors showed that low ADAMTS9-AS2 expression was a significant independent predictor of poor survival in glioma. Overexpression of ADAMTS9-AS2 resulted in significant inhibition of cell migration in glioma, whereas knockdown of ADAMTS9-AS2 showed the opposite effect. We also found that ADAMTS9-AS2 expression was negatively correlated with DNA methyltransferase-1 (DNMT1). In addition, DNMT1 knockdown led to remarkable enhancement of ADAMTS9-AS2 expression. By 5-aza-dC treatment, the ADAMTS9-AS2 expression was also reactivated. The results suggested that ADAMTS9-AS2 is a novel tumor suppressor modulated by DNMT1 in glioma. LncRNA ADAMTS9-AS2 may serve as a potential biomarker and therapeutic target for glioma.

The objective of the study was to investigate the expression and function of reprogramming-related long noncoding RNA (lincRNA-ROR) in glioma and glioma stem cells (GSCs). With real-time quantitative PCR, we analyzed lincRNA-ROR expression levels in 26 primary glioma patients and the expression correlation of lincRNA-ROR with SOX11 and KLF4. To explore its functional role, gain- and loss-of-function studies were performed to assess the effect of lincRNA-ROR on cell proliferation, expression rate of GSCs marker CD133, and glioma stem sphere-forming ability in vitro. We found that the lincRNA-ROR expression was significantly lower in glioma tissues than in adjacent normal tissues. Knockdown of lincRNA-ROR expression by small hairpin RNA (shRNA) significantly elevated the cell proliferation and enhanced the CD133 expression rate and glioma stem sphere-forming ability in U87 cells, while overexpression of lincRNA-ROR in U87 cells showed the opposite effect. Moreover, we found that the expression of lincRNA-ROR was negatively correlated with stem cell factor KLF4 and the "up- and down-regulation" of lincRNA-ROR resulted in inverse modulation of KLF4 messenger RNA (mRNA) expression. Our results suggest that the reprogramming-related lincRNA-ROR may serve as a novel tumor suppressor gene in glioma, which can inhibit the proliferation of cancer cell and self-renewal of GSCs, partly by inhibiting the KLF4 expression. Further research about lincRNA-ROR may provide a novel biomarker and therapeutic target of glioma for cancer clinic in future.