MiRNA-34a overexpression inhibits multiple myeloma cancer stem cell growth in mice by suppressing TGIF2.

Hematological malignancy originated from B-cell line, multiple myeloma (MM), is a kind of plasma cells in bone marrow hyperplasia and cause of osteoclast-mediated skeletal destruction disease. MiR-34a plays an important epigenetic regulating role in malignant tumors and presents a therapeutic potential. In this study, we investigated the effects of overexpression of miR-34a in MM cancer stem cells (CSCs) on tumor growth and bone lesions. Here we showed that miR-34a overexpression inhibited cell proliferation, colony formation, and increased CSC apoptosis in vitro. The apparent epigenetic modulation induced by miR-34a overexpression was found no only in MM RPMI8226 cells but also in CSC xenograft MM. Both bioinformatics prediction and dual-luciferase reporter assay showed that transforming growth interaction factor 2 (TGIF2) was sufficient to confer miR-34a regulation. The results of qRT-PCR and Western blot assays demonstrated that the expression of TGIF2 was significant decreased in tumor tissues from NOD/SCID mice injected with miR-34a-MM CSCs. We conclude that miR-34a overexpression in MM CSCs significantly suppressed the tumorigenicity and lytic bone lesions in mouse model by inducing apoptosis and inhibiting TGIF2 expression.