Division of Molecular and Cellular Medicine, National Cancer Center Research Institute, 5-1-1 Tsukiji, Chuo-ku, Tokyo, 104-0045, Japan.
Department of Translational Research for Extracellular Vesicles, Tokyo Medical University, 6-7-1 Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, 160-0023, Japan.
J Biomed Sci. 2019 Jan 12;26(1):7. doi: 10.1186/s12929-019-0500-6.
Cancer metastasis is the major cause of mortality in cancer cases and is responsible for cancer deaths. It is known that cancer cells communicate with surrounding microenvironmental cells, such as fibroblast cells, immune cells, and endothelial cells, to create a cancer microenvironment for their progression. Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are small vesicles that can be secreted by most types of cells and play an important role in cell-to-cell communications via transferring bioactive cargos, including variable RNAs, such as microRNAs (miRNAs), to recipient cells. miRNAs are a class of small noncoding RNAs that posttranscriptionally regulate gene expression. The transfer of them to recipient cells influences the metastatic process of primary tumors. In this review, we summarize the function of miRNAs packaged in EVs in cancer metastasis and discuss the clinical utility of miRNAs in EVs.
癌症转移是癌症病例死亡的主要原因，也是癌症死亡的原因。已知癌细胞与周围的微环境细胞（如成纤维细胞、免疫细胞和内皮细胞）相互交流，为其进展创造癌症微环境。细胞外囊泡 (EVs) 是可以由大多数类型的细胞分泌的小囊泡，通过传递生物活性货物（包括可变 RNA，如 microRNAs (miRNAs)）在细胞间通讯中发挥重要作用到受体细胞。miRNAs 是一类小的非编码 RNA，可在后转录水平上调节基因表达。它们转移到受体细胞会影响原发性肿瘤的转移过程。在这篇综述中，我们总结了包裹在 EVs 中的 miRNAs 在癌症转移中的功能，并讨论了 EVs 中 miRNAs 的临床应用。
