Identification of SLC7A11‐AS1/SLC7A11 pair as a ferroptosis‐related therapeutic target for hepatocellular carcinoma

Abstract

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), a prevalent malignancy worldwide, poses significant challenges in terms of prognosis, necessitating innovative therapeutic approaches. Ferroptosis offers notable advantages over apoptosis, holding promise as a novel therapeutic approach for HCC complexities. Moreover, while the interaction between long non‐coding RNAs (lncRNAs) and mRNAs is pivotal in various physiological and pathological processes, their involvement in ferroptosis remains relatively unexplored. In this study, we constructed a ferroptosis‐related lncRNA‐mRNA correlation network in HCC using Pearson correlation analysis. Notably, the SLC7A11‐AS1/SLC7A11 pair, exhibiting high correlation, was identified. Bioinformatics analysis revealed a significant correlation between the expression levels of this pair and key clinical characteristics of HCC patients, including gender, pathology, Ishak scores and tumour size. And poor prognosis was associated with high expression of this pair. Functional experiments demonstrated that SLC7A11‐AS1, by binding to the 3′UTR region of SLC7A11 mRNA, enhanced its stability, thereby promoting HCC cell growth and resistance to erastin‐ induced ferroptosis. Additionally, in vivo studies confirmed that SLC7A11‐AS1 knockdown potentiated the inhibitory effects of erastin on tumour growth. Overall, our findings suggest that targeting the SLC7A11‐AS1/SLC7A11 pair holds promise as a potential therapeutic strategy for HCC patients.