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. 2015 Sep 9;7(3):1806-14.
doi: 10.3390/cancers7030863.

MicroRNA Polymorphisms in Cancer: A Literature Analysis

Veronika Pipan  1 , Minja Zorc  2 , Tanja Kunej  3
Affiliations

MicroRNA Polymorphisms in Cancer: A Literature Analysis

Veronika Pipan et al. Cancers (Basel). .

Abstract

Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) located in microRNA (miRNA) genes (miR-SNPs) have attracted increasing attention in recent years due to their involvement in the development of various types of cancer. Therefore, a systematic review on this topic was needed. From 55 scientific publications we collected 20 SNPs, which are located within 18 miRNA encoding genes and have been associated with 16 types of cancer. Among 20 miRNA gene polymorphisms 13 are located within the premature miRNA region, five within mature, and two within mature seed miRNA region. We graphically visualized a network of miRNA-cancer associations which revealed miRNA genes and cancer types with the highest number of connections. Our study showed that, despite a large number of variations currently known to be located within miRNA genes in humans, most of them have not yet been tested for association with cancer. MicroRNA SNPs collected in this study represent only 0.43% of known miRNA gene variations (20/4687). Results of the present study will be useful to researchers investigating the clinical use of miRNAs, such as the roles of miRNAs as diagnostic markers and therapeutic targets.

Keywords: cancer; microRNA (miRNA); single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP).

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Workflow of the study and main results.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Network representing 75 associatons between 18 miRNA encoding genes and 16 types of cancer. MicroRNA encoding genes are presented as pink nodes while different types of cancer are shown as blue nodes. The size of a node correlates with the number of its associations. Red solid edges represent associations with negative outcome (increased risk of cancer, overall survival risk, unfavorable overall and recurrence-free survival, and increased risk of recurrence and death) and green dashed edges represent associations with positive outcome (decreased risk of cancer, better response to chemotherapy, increased survival, protective against mortality, favorable overall and recurrence-free survival, and decreased risk of recurrence). MicroRNA host genes are presented in parentheses.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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