Greco Steven J, Rameshwar Pranela
University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey-New Jersey Medical School, Newark, NJ, USA.
Methods Mol Biol. 2013;1024:87-96. doi: 10.1007/978-1-62703-453-1_7.
A significant breakthrough in the field of research was the identification of microRNAs (miRNAs), which are small molecule, single-stranded nucleic acids. MiRNAs have diverse roles in cellular biology with the ability for translation in different areas of medicine. The size of miRNAs provides them for passage through gap junction. Recent studies have demonstrated the passage of miRNAs through gap junctional intercellular communication (GJIC) among cancer cells and between breast cancer cells and bone marrow stroma. The transfer of miRNAs has been implicated in the etiology of breast cancer dormancy. To this end, we have developed a miRNA reporter assay to assess the ability of miRNAs to be transferred between stem and breast cancer cells and target a specific recognition sequence.
研究领域的一项重大突破是微小RNA（miRNA）的鉴定，它是小分子单链核酸。miRNA在细胞生物学中具有多种作用，在医学的不同领域都有翻译能力。miRNA的大小使其能够通过间隙连接。最近的研究表明，miRNA可通过癌细胞之间以及乳腺癌细胞与骨髓基质之间的间隙连接细胞间通讯（GJIC）进行传递。miRNA的转移与乳腺癌休眠的病因有关。为此，我们开发了一种miRNA报告基因检测方法，以评估miRNA在干细胞和乳腺癌细胞之间转移并靶向特定识别序列的能力。
