Long noncoding RNAs profiles of adrenocortical carcinomas, adrenocortical adenomas and normal adrenal cortex

Adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC) is an aggressive malignancy with high rates of recurrence following surgical resection. Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) play an important role in cancer development. Pathogenesis of adrenal tumours has been characterised by mRNA, microRNA and methylation expression signatures but it is unknown if this extends to lncRNAs. We sought to describe lncRNA expression signatures in adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC), adrenal cortical adenoma (ACA) and normal adrenal cortex (NAC). RNA was extracted from freshly frozen tissue with confirmation of diagnosis by histopathology. Focused lncRNA and mRNA transcriptome analysis was performed using the ArrayStar Human LncRNA V3.0 microarray. Differentially expressed lncRNAs were validated using qRT-PCR. 21 samples were used in total, 15 cases were included (10 ACCs and 5 ACAs) and compared to 6 controls (NAC). Differentially expressed lncRNAs were selected if they had a minimum fold change of 2.0 up or down regulated and a P-value corrected by the false discovery rate of equal to or less than 0.05.