Mol Biol Rep. 2026 Feb 21;53(1):409. doi: 10.1007/s11033-026-11565-9.
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Breast cancer (BC) and Thyroid cancer (TC) are prevalent malignancies in women that share epidemiological and molecular features. Emerging evidence indicates that non-coding RNAs are key regulators of cancer associated gene expression. Long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) drive tumor progression by acting as competing endogenous RNAs (ceRNAs), sponging microRNA (miRNA) to deregulate oncogenic messenger RNA (mRNA). The influence of functional genetic polymorphisms of lncRNAs on their expression, as well as the expression of their ceRNA components RNA in a direct comparative context of BC and TC, remains unexplored.
METHODS: 60 breast cancer and 60 thyroid cancer tissue samples, alongside matched adjacent healthy controls from a Pakistani female patient, were used. Genotyping of lncRNA H19 SNPs (rs3741219 and rs2839698) was performed using Polymerase Chain Reaction-Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) followed by quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) to assess the expression of lncRNA H19, miR-152, and DNMT1. Expression and genotype associations, association with clinical parameters, and diagnostic and prognostic utility of the studied RNA were statistically evaluated.
RESULT: Genotyping revealed that rs3741219 showed significant tumor-control differences in breast cancer (p < 0.05). Expression analysis revealed upregulation of lncRNA H19 and DNMT1, and downregulation of miR-152, in tumor samples compared with adjacent healthy controls in both cancers. In genotype-expression analysis, rs3741219 influenced lncRNA H19 expression in both cancer types. Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) analysis confirmed the strong diagnostic potential of H19 and DNMT1 (AUC 0.98-1.00). Correlation and regression analyses validated the proposed ceRNA interactions and their significant association with advanced cancer stage. A high-risk score from the H19/miR-152/DNMT1 axis was prognostic only in thyroid cancer (HR = 2.97).
PMID:41721915 | DOI:10.1007/s11033-026-11565-9
