MicroRNA-1908 is Upregulated in Human Osteosarcoma and Regulates Cell Proliferation and Migration by Repressing PTEN Expression

Osteosarcoma is a high-grade malignant bone neoplasm. Although the introduction of chemotherapy has reduced its mortality, >50% of patients develop chemoresistance and have an extremely poor prognosis due to pulmonary metastasis. Several molecular pathways contributing to osteosarcoma development and progression have recently been identified. Various studies have addressed the genes involved in the metastasis of osteosarcoma. However, the highly complex molecular mechanisms of metastasis remain to be elucidated. Recent studies have emphasized causative links between aberrant microRNA expression patterns and osteosarcoma progression. miR-1908 is dysregulated in certain human types of cancer. The expression pattern, clinical significance and biological role of miR-1908 in osteosarcoma, however, remain largely undefined. In the present study, we showed that miR-1908 was markedly upregulated in osteosarcoma cells and tissues compared with normal bone tissues using RT-qPCR. miR-1908 upregulation in osteosarcoma tissues was significantly associated with cell proliferation, invasion, advanced TNM stage and tumor growth. Both gain- and loss-of-function studies showed that miR-1908 markedly increased the ability of osteosarcoma cells to proliferate and to invade through Matrigel in vitro. Analyses using mouse xenograft model revealed that xenografts of miR-1908 stable-expressing osteosarcoma cells exhibited a significant increase in tumor volume and weight, compared with the control group. Subsequent investigations revealed that miR-1908 directly inhibited the expression of phosphatase and tensin homolog deleted on chromosome ten (PTEN). Using a luciferase reporter carrying the 3'-untranslated region (3'-UTR) of PTEN, we identified PTEN as a direct target of miR-1908. Collectively, the results showed that, miR-1908 promotes proliferation and invasion of osteosarcoma cells by repressing PTEN expression.