Decreasing lncRNA HOTAIR expression inhibits human colorectal cancer stem cells.

Research on the relationship between aberrant long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) and cancer stem cell (CSC) biology in cancer patients has been recently gaining attention. The goal of this study was to investigate whether the decreasing lncRNA HOTAIR expression would inhibit human colorectal cancer (CRC) stem cells. CD133(+)CSCs were isolated from human CRC LoVo cell line by using a magnetic-activated cell sorting system, and were transfected with the expression vector-based small hairpin RNA targeting HOTAIR (shHOTAIR). The ability of cellular proliferation, migration, invasion, colony-forming, and the epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT)-associated molecule expression as well as the tumorigenicity of CD133(+)-shHOTAIR were evaluated by the MTT, wound-healing, cellular invasion, colony formation and Western blot assays, respectively. This study found that, when compared with control cells in vitro, CD133(+)-shHOTAIR exhibited the decreased HOTAIR expression, suppressed cellular proliferation, migration, invasion, colony-forming, and inhibited the Vimentin expression with increased E-cadherin expression. In particular, the down-regulation of the HOTAIR expression in CD133(+)CSCs markedly attenuated the tumor growth and lung metastasis in xenograft nude mice. Taken together, this study found that down-regulating the HOTAIR expression in CD133(+)CSCs could serve as a potential anti-cancer regimen to inhibit the invasiveness and metastasis of CRC CSCs.