miRNA-646 suppresses osteosarcoma cell metastasis by downregulating fibroblast growth factor 2 (FGF2)

MicroRNAs are short regulatory RNAs that play crucial roles in cancer development and progression. MicroRNA-646 (miR-646) is downregulated in many human cancers, and increasing evidence indicates that it functions as a tumor suppressor. However, the role of miR-646 in osteosarcoma remains unclear. Expression levels of miR-646 in osteosarcoma cell lines and patient tissues were evaluated by quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR), and the clinicopathological significance of the resultant data was later analyzed. Next, we investigated the role of miR-646 to determine its potential roles on osteosarcoma cell proliferation, migration, and invasion in vitro. A luciferase reporter assay was conducted to confirm the target gene of miR-646, and the results were validated in the osteosarcoma cell line. In this study, we found that miR-646 was downregulated in osteosarcoma cell lines and osteosarcoma tissues compared with normal osteoblast cell line NHOst and paired adjacent nontumor tissue. We found that a lower expression of miR-646 was associated with metastasis. In osteosarcoma cells, overexpression of miR-646 inhibited cell proliferation, migration, and invasion. In contrast, downregulation of miR-646 expression promoted osteosarcoma cell proliferation, migration, and invasion. Next, we identified that the FGF2 gene is a novel direct target of miR-646 in osteosarcoma cells. Moreover, enforced expression of FGF2 partially reversed the inhibition of cell proliferation, migration, and invasion that was caused by miR-646. Our study demonstrated that miR-646 might be a tumor suppressor in osteosarcoma via the regulation of FGF2, which provided a potential prognostic biomarker and therapeutic target.