Characterization of MicroRNA Expression Profiles and the Discovery of Novel MicroRNAs Involved in Cancer during Human Embryonic Development

MicroRNAs (miRNAs), approximately 22-nucleotide non-coding RNA molecules, regulate a variety of pivotal physiological or pathological processes, including embryonic development and tumorigenesis. To obtain comprehensive expression profiles of miRNAs in human embryos, we characterized miRNA expression in weeks 4-6 of human embryonic development using miRNA microarrays and identified 50 human-embryo-specific miRNAs (HES-miRNAs). Furthermore, we selected three non-conserved or primate-specific miRNAs, hsa-miR-638, -720, and -1280, and examined their expression levels in various normal and tumor tissues. The results show that expression of most miRNAs is extremely low during early human embryonic development. In addition, the expression of some non-conserved or primate-specific miRNAs is significantly different between tumor and the corresponding normal tissue samples, suggesting that the miRNAs are closely related to the pathological processes of various tumors. This study presents the first comprehensive overview of miRNA expression during human embryonic development and offers immediate evidence of the relationship between human early embryonic development and tumorigenesis.