IL-1β/NF-kb signaling promotes colorectal cancer cell growth through miR-181a/PTEN axis.

To date, the role of miRNA in tumorigenesis has been largely reported. It was found that miR-181a may be involved in the tumorigenesis of colon cancer. The purpose of this study was to investigate the mechanism of miR-181a in colon cancer carcinogenesis. The expression levels of IL-1β, NF-κB (RelA), and miR-181a in colon cancer tissue were higher than that in normal control tissue when assessed by real-timePCR. In addition, it was found that IL-1β induced the expression of miR-181a. The expression of PTEN was regulated by IL-1β-stimulated miR-181a expression. In a PTEN reporter plasmid, miR-181a binding site mutations were introduced. By using a luciferase reporter assay, it was found that wild type reported activity was lower than that of the mutant registration system activity. Furthermore, a siRNA strategy was used to find that IL-1B regulates miR-181a expression via NF-κB and then regulates PTEN expression. Consequently, repression of PTEN by miR-181a promotes colon cancer cell proliferation. Taken together, our data support a critical role for NF-κB-dependent upregulation of miR-181a; this represents a new pathway for the repression of PTEN and the promotion of cell proliferation upon IL-1β induction.