Wang Menglan, Wu Minjie, Xie Tian, Chen Jianxiang
College of Pharmacy, School of Medicine, Department of Hepatology, Institute of Hepatology and Metabolic Diseases, Institute of Integrated Chinese and Western Medicine for Oncology, The Affiliated Hospital of Hangzhou Normal University, Key Laboratory of Elemene Class Anti-Cancer Chinese Medicines, Engineering Laboratory of Development and Application of Traditional Chinese Medicines, Collaborative Innovation Center of Traditional Chinese Medicines of Zhejiang Province, Hangzhou Normal University, Hangzhou, China.
Laboratory of Cancer Genomics, Division of Cellular and Molecular Research, National Cancer Centre Singapore, Singapore, Singapore.
Front Genet. 2021 Feb 18;11:628655. doi: 10.3389/fgene.2020.628655. eCollection 2020.
Exonic circular RNAs (circRNAs) are a novel subgroup of non-coding RNAs, which are generated by a back-splicing mechanism of the exons or introns. Unlike the linear RNA, circRNA forms a covalently closed loop, and it normally appears more abundant than the linear products of its host gene. Due to the relatively high specificity and stability of circular RNAs in tissues and body fluid, circular RNAs have attracted widely scientific interest for its potential application in cancer diagnosis and as a guide for preclinical therapy, especially for hard-to-treat cancers with high heterogeneity, such as hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Thus, we summarize the updated knowledge of circular RNAs, including the mechanism of the generation of endogenous circular RNAs and their regulatory, diagnostic, and therapeutic roles in HCC.
外显子环状RNA（circRNAs）是一类新型的非编码RNA，由外显子或内含子的反向剪接机制产生。与线性RNA不同，circRNA形成共价闭合环，并且通常比其宿主基因的线性产物更丰富。由于环状RNA在组织和体液中具有相对较高的特异性和稳定性，环状RNA因其在癌症诊断中的潜在应用以及作为临床前治疗的指导，尤其是对于具有高度异质性的难治性癌症（如肝细胞癌（HCC）），而引起了广泛的科学关注。因此，我们总结了环状RNA的最新知识，包括内源性环状RNA的产生机制及其在肝癌中的调控、诊断和治疗作用。
