Reducing Metastatic Prostate Cancer

The study found that the presence of excess small RNA prevents metastases development in prostate cancer patients, and in patients with bone metastases, tumor cells express less protein.

Prostate cancer (PC) is the most common malignant tumor in men, and metastatic form of this disease is the leading cause of death in the world. At the time of this paper, there was no definitive treatment for metastatic prostate cancer.

To reduce the mortality rate of this disease, we must focus on treatments development that reduce metastatic spread of PC. In this study, they focused on reducing the spread of bone metastases, as this is a common site for metastases to spread and is associated with a lot of pain and discomfort in patients.

Researchers decided to use tiny RNA (microRNA – miRNA) to prevent primary prostate cancer metastases from spreading to the bone. PC cell lines were transduced to overexpress miRNA-379 (miR-379). The activity of these cells was tested in vivo and in vitro using functional assays.

The study results showed that PC cells overexpressing miR-379 showed significant reductions in proliferation, migration, colony formation, and bone cell attachment in vitro tests.

A possible proposed mechanism was on that dysregulation of miR-379 in PC cells affects the secretion of GDF-15 by osteoblasts, which in turn promotes bone metastasis colonies formation.

Overexpression of miR-379 in PC3 cells in vivo also resulted in a significant reduction in bone metastases spread. Additionally, it has been demonstrated that subjects who develop bone metastases exhibit decreased secretion of miR-379 from cancer cells.

These results confurm that miR-379 may be a therapeutic target to prevent disease progression in PC patients.

Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/oncology/articles/10.3389/fonc.2022.1057455/full