Long Intergenic Non-Protein Coding RNA 00342 Exerts Oncogenic Effects in Prostate Cancer by Sponging microRNA-19b-3p and Thereby Increasing Forkhead Box F2 Expression

Abstract

Prostate cancer is one of the most common malignancies in males with increasing morbidity and mortality. Related reports indicate that lncRNAs may be a new class of potential tumor molecular markers. Compared with the normal tissues, the expression level of LINC00342 in prostate cancer tissues was significantly increased. Compared with normal PC3 and DU145 cells, cells silenced by the LINC00342 gene significantly decreased the ability of proliferation, migration, invasion, and induced apoptosis. Further, the FISH assay showed that LINC00342 could interact with miR-19b-3p and control the expression of Forkhead Box F2 (FOXF2), the target of miR-19b-3p. LINC00342 could activate the ERK/AKT signaling pathways. Tumor xenograft formation assay demonstrated that the down-regulated LINC00342 prevented tumor formation in vivo. Taken together, these results indicated that the interference of LINC00342 expression might inhibit the invasion, migration and promote apoptosis of prostate cancer cells by inhibiting the ERK1/2/AKT signaling pathway via sponging miRNA-19b-3p and thereby increasing FOXF2 expression.