RNA editome imbalance in hepatocellular carcinoma

Adenosine-to-inosine conversion (A-to-I editing), a posttranscriptional modification on RNA, contributes to extensive transcriptome diversity. A-to-I editing is a hydrolytic deamination process, catalyzed by adenosine deAminase acting on double-stranded RNA (ADAR) family of enzymes. ADARs are essential for normal mammalian development, and disturbance in RNA editing has been implicated in various pathologic disorders, including cancer. Thanks to next-generation sequencing, rich databases of transcriptome evolution for cancer development at the resolution of single nucleotide have been generated. Extensive bioinformatic analysis revealed a complex picture of RNA editing change during transformation. Cancer displayed global hypoediting of Alu-repetitive elements with gene-specific editing pattern. In particular, hepatocellular carcinoma editome is severely disrupted and characterized by hyper- and hypoediting of different genes, such as hyperedited AZIN1 (antizyme inhibitor 1) and FLNB (filamin B, β) and hypoedited COPA (coatomer protein complex, subunit α). In hepatocellular carcinoma, not only the recoding editing in exons, but also the editing in noncoding regions (e.g., Alu-repetitive elements and microRNA) displays such complex editing pattern with site-specific editing trend. In this review, we will discuss current research progress on the involvement of abnormal A-to-I editing in cancer development, more specifically on hepatocellular carcinoma.