CCAT1 promotes hepatocellular carcinoma cell proliferation and invasion.

It has been reported that CCAT1 is involved in the development of malignancies including colon cancer and gastric cancer. However, the role of CCAT1 in HCC still remains unknown. Real-time PCR was performed to test the relative expression of CCAT1 in HCC tissues and cell lines. We performed Chi-Square Analysis to study the correlation between clinical characteristics and CCAT1 expression. Based on the correlation, cell proliferation assay, cell invasion assay, wound healing assay and cell apoptosis assay were conducted in two HCC cell lines to examine the regulatory effect of CCAT1 on the HCC cells. The results indicated that the expression of CCAT1 was significantly increased in HCC tissues and cells compared with controls. We also found that the abnormally expressed CCAT1 could promote cell proliferation, migration and invasion. Taken together, our findings demonstrated that the aberrant expression of CCAT1 promotes hepatocellular carcinoma in vitro.