Overexpression of miR-506 inhibits growth of osteosarcoma through Snail2.

Osteosarcoma (OS) is a prevalent primary bone malignancy and its distal metastasis accounts for the majority of OS-related death. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) play critical roles during cancer metastasis. Thus, elucidation of the involvement of specific miRNAs in the metastasis of OS may provide novel therapeutic targets for OS treatment. Here, we showed that in the OS specimens from patients, the levels of miR-506 were significantly decreased and the levels of Snail2 were significantly increased, compared to the paired normal bone tissue. MiR-506 and Snail2 inversely correlated in patients' specimen. Bioinformatics analyses predicted that miR-506 may target the 3'-UTR of Snail2 mRNA to inhibit its translation, which was confirmed by luciferase-reporter assay. Moreover, miR-506 overexpression inhibited Snail2-mediated cell invasiveness, while miR-506 depletion increased Snail2-mediated cell invasiveness in OS cells. Together, our data suggest that miR-506 suppression in OS cells may promote Snail2-mediated cancer metastasis.