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Review
. 2017 Mar 28;8(13):22262-22278.
doi: 10.18632/oncotarget.14763.

MicroRNAs in melanoma development and resistance to target therapy

Luigi Fattore  1 , Susan Costantini  2 , Debora Malpicci  3 , Ciro Francesco Ruggiero  3 , Paolo Antonio Ascierto  1 , Carlo M Croce  4 , Rita Mancini  5 , Gennaro Ciliberto  1   6
Affiliations
Review

MicroRNAs in melanoma development and resistance to target therapy

Luigi Fattore et al. Oncotarget. .

Abstract

microRNAs constitute a complex class of pleiotropic post-transcriptional regulators of gene expression involved in the control of several physiologic and pathologic processes. Their mechanism of action is primarily based on the imperfect matching of a seed region located at the 5' end of a 21-23 nt sequence with a partially complementary sequence located in the 3' untranslated region of target mRNAs. This leads to inhibition of mRNA translation and eventually to its degradation. Individual miRNAs are capable of binding to several mRNAs and several miRNAs are capable of influencing the function of the same mRNAs. In recent years networks of miRNAs are emerging as capable of controlling key signaling pathways responsible for the growth and propagation of cancer cells. Furthermore several examples have been provided which highlight the involvement of miRNAs in the development of resistance to targeted drug therapies. In this review we provide an updated overview of the role of miRNAs in the development of melanoma and the identification of the main downstream pathways controlled by these miRNAs. Furthermore we discuss a group of miRNAs capable to influence through their respective up- or down-modulation the development of resistance to BRAF and MEK inhibitors.

Keywords: drug resistance; intracellular pathways; melanoma; miRNA; target therapy.

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Conflict of interest statement

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. Oncogenic BRAF V600/MAPK signaling pathway and the most relevant miRNAs connected to its deregulation in metastatic melanoma [59, 70, 75, 76]
Arrows and blocking bars indicate respectively the positive or negative regulation of MAPK signaling on a sets of miRNAs. Blocking bars also indicate the repression of specific miRNA exerted on specific members of this signaling pathway.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Comparison between the miRNAs resulted to be in common among the groups 1-4 subdivided between up-regulated A. and down-regulated B. miRNAs, and between the related deregulated pathways C. and D. by Venn diagram (http://bioinfogp.cnb.csic.es/tools/venny/). We show the group 1 in violet, group 2 in yellow, group 3 in green, and group 4 in pink.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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