Breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer mortality in women worldwide. Molecular therapy is needed to improve the outcome in patients with breast cancer. miR-203 participates in cancer cell proliferation, transformation, and apoptosis. This study showed that miR-203 was upregulated in breast cancer tissues and the MCF-7 cell line. miR-203 knockdown suppressed colony formation and transformation and also limited migration in MCF-7 cells. Fibroblast growth factor 2 (FGF2) was confirmed as a novel target of miR-203, as miR-203 knockdown induced an enhanced expression of FGF2 in MCF-7 cells. Moreover, FGF2 can reverse transforming growth factor-β signal pathway to suppress breast cancer. These findings provide new insights with potential therapeutic applications for the treatment of breast cancer.

Objective: The incidence of brain metastases greatly varies in patients with non-small-cell lung cancer, and molecular markers are considered to predict brain metastases. Therefore, this study sought to identify the predictive value and potential mechanisms of miRNA-328 and miRNA-378 for brain metastases in non-small-cell lung cancer. Methods: Patients who received a curable surgery for their lung cancer were screened according to our criteria. Formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded samples from the patients were examined for the expression of miRNA-328 and miRNA-378 using real-time polymerase chain reaction and the expression of N-cadherin, E-cadherin, vascular endothelial growth factor, protein kinase Cα and S100B were investigated using immunohistochemical staining. Results: In total, 86 patients were screened for this study and 23 patients were diagnosed with brain metastases during the follow-up period. Comparing patients with and without brain metastases, the expression of miRNA-328 and miRNA-378 in tumor tissues were significantly different (P = 6.2 × 10 −5 and P = 2.8 × 10 −5 , respectively). For the patients with brain metastases, the expression of miRNA-328and miRNA-378 in tumor tissues compared with para-carcinoma tissues were also significantly different (P = 2.2 × 10 −5 and P = 1.6 × 10 −5 , respectively). For patients with brain metastases, the association between miRNA-328 and protein kinase Cα was significant (r = 0.591, P = 0.003), but that between miRNA-378 and protein kinase Cα was not significant (r = 0.259, P = 0.232). Conclusions:The expression of miRNA-328 and miRNA-378 in tumor tissues can be used to predict brain metastases in patients with non-small-cell lung cancer. miRNA-328 might promote brain metastases by regulating the expression of protein kinase Cα. However, the mechanisms of miRNA-378 to promote brain metastases should be studied in the future.

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