Bioinformatic Analysis of Potential Biomarker for hsa-miR-196b-5p in Mesothelioma

Malignant pleural mesothelioma is a rare neoplasia with a poor prognosis, and the majority of patients have advanced disease at the time of presentation. Exposure to asbestos is the most important risk factor for malignant pleural mesothelioma. To determine the cytotoxicity of geldanamycin in mesothelioma H28 cells, the MTT assay was used. To determine changes in microRNA (miRNA) expression in geldanamycin-treated H28 cells, miRNA microarray analysis was performed. To determine the function of miR-196b-5p, we performed Gene Ontology and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes pathway enrichment analyses of miR-196b-5p targets predicted by miRwalk. Our data showed that geldanamycin treatment reduced H28 cell viability in a dose-dependent manner. MicroRNA array analyses showed that expression of hsa-miR-196b-5p was downregulated in geldanamycin-treated H28 cells. Geldanamycin regulated miRNAs with roles in processes such as aging, angiogenesis, apoptosis, cell cycle, cell differentiation, cell proliferation, DNA repair, and secretion. Survival analysis showed that decreased expression of hsa-miR-196b-5p was significantly associated with a better outcome in mesothelioma patients. Expression of miR-196b-5p was also significantly associated with the developmental stages of mesothelioma. To narrow down the target genes of miR-196b-5p, we determined the overlap between the predicted target genes of miR-196b-5p and downregulated mRNAs in ovarian cancer based on the Gene Expression Omnibus dataset GSE12345. PDE1A, LAMA4, and PAPPA were identified as both miR-196b-5p targets and downregulated genes in GSE12345 and were thus considered targets of miR-196b-5p. Gene-miRNA expression correlation analysis showed that PDE1A, LAMA4, and PAPPA expression was negatively correlated with miR-196b-5p expression. We suggest that geldanamycin has potential for the treatment of mesothelioma via regulating miR-196b-5p. Furthermore, miR-196b-5p may be a potential biomarker for mesothelioma.