BackgroundEpithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) is a crucial step for solid tumor progression and plays an important role in cancer invasion and metastasis. RNF8 is an ubiquitin E3 ligase with RING domain, and plays essential roles in DNA damage response and cell cycle regulation. However the role of RNF8 in the pathogenesis of breast cancer is still unclear.MethodsThe expression of RNF8 was examined in different types of breast cell lines by Western Blotting. EMT associated markers were examined by Immunofluorescence and Western Blotting in MCF-7 when RNF8 was ectopically overexpressed, or in MDA-MB-231 when RNF8 was depleted. Transwell and wound healing assays were performed to assess the effect of RNF8 on cell mobility. The xenograft model was done with nude mice to investigate the role of RNF8 in tumor metastasis in vivo. Breast tissue arrays were used to examine the expression of RNF8 by immunohistochemistry. Kaplan-Meier survival analysis for the relationship between survival time and RNF8 signature in breast cancer was done with an online tool (http://kmplot.com/analysis/).ResultsRNF8 is overexpressed in highly metastatic breast cancer cell lines. Overexpression of RNF8 in MCF-7 significantly promoted EMT phenotypes and facilitated cell migration. On the contrary, silencing of RNF8 in MDA-MB-231 induced MET phenotypes and inhibited cell migration. Furthermore, we proved that these metastatic behavior promoting effects of RNF8 in breast cancer was associated with the inactivation of GSK-3β and activation of β-catenin signaling. With nude mice xenograft model, we found that shRNA mediated-downregulation of RNF8 reduced tumor metastasis in vivo. In addition, we found that RNF8 expression was higher in malignant breast cancer than that of the paired normal breast tissues, and was positively correlated with lymph node metastases and poor survival time.ConclusionsRNF8 induces EMT in the breast cancer cells and promotes breast cancer metastasis, suggesting that RNF8 could be used as a potential therapeutic target for the prevention and treatment of breast cancer.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13046-016-0363-6) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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RNF8 (ring finger protein 8), a RING finger E3 ligase best characterized for its role in DNA repair and sperm formation via ubiquitination, has been found to promote tumor metastasis in breast cancer recently. However, whether RNF8 also plays a role in other types of cancer, especially in the lung cancer, remains unknown. We show here that RNF8 expression levels are markedly increased in human lung cancer tissues and negatively correlated with the survival time of patients. Overexpression of RNF8 promotes the EMT process and migration ability of lung cancer cells, while knockdown of RNF8 demonstrates the opposite effects. In addition, overexpression of RNF8 activates the PI3K/Akt signaling pathway, knockdown of RNF8 by siRNA inhibits this activation, and pharmacological inhibition of PI3K/Akt in RNF8 overexpressing cells also reduces the expression of EMT markers and the ability of migration. Furthermore, RNF8 is found to directly interact with Slug and promoted the K63-Ub of Slug, and knockdown of Slug disrupts RNF8dependent EMT in A549 cells whereas overexpression of Slug rescues RNF8-dependent MET in H1299 cells. And depletion of RNF8 expression by shRNA inhibits metastasis of lung cancer cells in vivo. Taken together, these results indicate that RNF8 is a key regulator of EMT process in lung cancer and suggest that inhibition of RNF8 could be a useful strategy for lung cancer treatment. Implications: This study provides a new mechanistic insight into the noval role of RNF8 and identifies RNF8 as a potential new therapeutic target for the treatment of lung cancer.

Breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer-associated deaths among females. In recent decades, microRNAs (miRNAs), a type of short non-coding RNA that regulates gene expression at the post-transcription level, have been reported to participate in the regulation of many hub genes associated with tumorigenesis, tumor progression, and metastasis. However, the precise mechanism by which miRNAs regulate breast cancer metastasis remains poorly discussed, which limits the opportunity for the development of novel, effective therapeutic targets. Here, we aimed to determine the miR-622-related principal regulatory mechanism in cancer. First, we found that miR-622 was significantly related to a poor prognosis in various cancers. By utilizing an integrated miRNA prediction process, we identified 77 promising targets and constructed a protein-protein interaction network. Furthermore, enrichment analyses, including GO and KEGG pathway analyses, were performed to determine the potential function of miR-622, which revealed regulation networks and potential functions of miR-622. Then, we identified a key cluster comprised of six hub genes in the protein-protein interaction network. These genes were further chosen for pan-cancer expression, prognostic and predictive marker analyses based on the TCGA and GEO datasets to mine the potential clinical values of these hub genes. To further validate our bioinformatic results, the regulatory axis of miR-622 and RNF8, one of the hub genes recently reported to promote breast cancer cell EMT process and breast cancer metastasis, was selected as in vitro proof of concept. In vitro, we demonstrated the direct regulation of RNF8 by miR-622 and found that the predicted miR-622-RNF8 axis could regulate RNF8-induced epithelial-mesenchymal transition, cell migration, and cell viability. These results were further demonstrated with rescue experiments. We established a closed-loop miRNA-target-phenotype research model that integrated the bioinformatic analysis of the miRNA target genes and experimental validation of the identified key miRNA-target-phenotype axis. We not only identified the hub target genes of miR-622 in silico but also revealed the regulatory mechanism of miR-622 in breast cancer cell EMT process, viability, and migration in vitro for the first time.

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