MicroRNA-122-3p inhibits tumor cell proliferation and induces apoptosis by targeting Forkhead box O in A549 cells.

The imbalance between cell proliferation and apoptosis was implicated to serve key roles in cancer pathogenesis. The characteristics of microRNAs (miRNAs/miRs) have attracted much attention in research focusing on cancer pathogenesis in recent years. miR-122-3p has been reported to be associated with a number of disease processes and pathogenesis, including lung cancer. The present study aimed to investigate the association of miR-122-3p expression level with cell proliferation and apoptosis in a lung cancer cell line. A549 cells were transfected with miR-122-3p to interrupt the expression of miR-122-3p. Subsequently, MTT and BrdU assay, and western blot were used to analyze the influence of miR-122-3p on lung cancer cell proliferation, cell viability and its underlying mechanism. The present study revealed that, by targeting p27, overexpression of miR-122-3p inhibited cell proliferation in lung cancer. Furthermore, the cell apoptosis analysis suggested that overexpression of miR-122-3p was able to inhibit cell apoptosis by targeting Forkhead box O. These findings suggest that miR-122-3p may be associated with the pathology and progression of lung cancer and be a new therapeutic target for this disease.