Cancer associated-mesenchymal stem cells accelerate hepatocellular carcinoma progression though lncRNA-MUF-miR-34a-Snail1 axis

Recently, long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) have been implicated in diverse processes of hepatocarcinogenesis. However, the involvement of lncRNAs in the crosstalk between LC-MSCs microenvironment and HCC progression is still unknown. In this study, for the first time, we investigated the role of lncRNAs in the crosstalk between HCC cells and LC-MSCs. We found that LC-MSCs acted as a pivotal contributor to HCC metastasis, cancer stem cell maintenance and epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT). GFP-positive Huh7, SMMC-7721 and HepG2 cells were cocultured with LC-MSCs for 7 days, GFP-positive HCC cells were sorted with BD FACSAria II. Total RNA was extracted with Trizol and hybridized to custom lncRNA microarray