Up-regulation of activates expression by competitive binding to miR-139-5p to promote hepatocellular carcinoma progression.

We aimed to assess the roles of small nucleolar RNA host gene 6 () in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) progression, and establish the lncRNA-miRNA-mRNA regulation mechanism for HCC therapy. is one of the host genes in small nucleolar RNAs (snoRNAs), which make a difference in the development of human cancers. is a gene encoding a member of the serpin superfamily of serine proteinase inhibitors with miRNA predicted by TargetScan and DIANA Tools. , serpin family H member 1 () and miR-139-5p expression levels in HCC tissues and cells were determined by quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR). Migration and invasion of HCC cells were measured by transwell assay. Cell cycle analysis was determined by using flow cytometry. 3-(4,5-dimethyl-2-thiazolyl)-2,5-diphenyl-2-H-tetrazolium bromide (MTT) assay and colony formation assay were performed for cell viability analysis. The expression of was detected by qRT-PCR and western blot. Dual-luciferase reporter gene assay was conducted to identify the targeted relationship between miR-139-5p and , as well as and miR-139-5p. The positive regulation between and was demonstrated in this study. In contrast, miR-139-5p was significantly down-regulated in HCC cells, the inhibition of miR-139-5p promotes the proliferation of HCC cells, and accelerated the cell cycle of HCC cells. Our study demonstrated the co-expression of and in HCC cells for the first time, which revealed that could serve as a novel oncogene for the HCC therapy by its regulation.