The role of miR-21 in proliferation and invasion capacity of human tongue squamous cell carcinoma in vitro.

Tongue squamous cell carcinoma is one of the most common cancers, which has the highest incidence in oral maxillofacial malignant tumors. MiR-21 may promote tumorigeness by down-regulating tumor suppressing genes and/or controlling the genes for cell differentiation and apoptosis, and it has been identified as the most expressive and unusual in a number of profiling experiments. The study shows there are high expressions of miR-21 in tongue squamous cell carcinoma cell lines (Tca8113 and its high metastatic lines), especially in high metastatic lines. miR-21 silencing could suppress the capacity of proliferation, migration and invasion, arrest the cell cycle and induce apoptosis of tongue squamous cell carcinoma cell lines (Tca8113 and its high metastatic lines). All the results indicate that miR-21 will probably open a new path to the gene therapy for oral squamous cell carcinoma.