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Vol 46(2012) N 4 p. 557-562; W.X. Zhang1,2, J.X. Qian3, H.L. Yi1, Z.D. Yang1, C.F. Wang1, J.Y. Chen1, X.Z. Wei1, Q. Fu1, H.X. Ma1* The microRNA-29 plays a central role in osteosarcoma pathogenesis and progression 1Department of Orthopedics, Changhai Hospital, Second Military University, Shanghai, 200433, China2Department of Orthopedics, the No. 401 Hospital of PLA, Shandong, 266071, China 3Department of Oncology, Changzheng Hospital, Second Military University, Shanghai, 200003, China *huimasub@sina.com Received - 2011-08-29; Accepted - 2011-09-26 Osteosarcoma is the most common type of bone cancer, with a peak incidence in the early child- hood. The relationship between microRNAs (miRNAs) and cancer development attracted more and more attention over the last few years. Members of the miRNA-29 family, including miRNA-29a, miRNA-29b, and miRNA-29c were shown to participate in the development of rhabdomyosarcoma and hepatocarcinogenesis. Here, it has been demonstrated miRNA-29a and miRNA-29b expression levels to be downregulated in most of the osteosarcoma tissues (23 from 30). Besides, miRNA-29a displayed ability to induce apoptosis in both U2OS and SAOS-2 osteoblastic cells. While miRNA-29 members induced apoptosis through p53 gene activation, the effect of miRNA-29a on osteoblastic cells was independent on p53 expression level. Moreover, Bcl-2 and Mcl-1 were earlier demonstrated to be the direct targets of miRNA-29 in many types of cancer tissues and cancers. In both U2OS and SAOS-2 osteoblastic cell types, overexpression of miRNA-29a also downregulated Bcl-2 and Mcl-1, while silencing of miRNA-29a increased their expression. In addition, enhanced expression of miRNA-29a increased the expression of two tumor suppressor genes, E2F1 and E2F3. In summary, data obtained high- light the role of miRNA-29a in the regulation of osteoblastic cell apoptosis by silencing Bcl-2 and Mcl-1 and inducing E2F1 and E2F3 expression. miRNA-29, osteosarcoma, apoptosis, cell cycle, U2OS cells, SAOS-2-2 cells |