Identification of miRNome profile in platelets isolated from VO patients

Several studies highlighted the importance of platelets in the tumormicroenvironment due to their ability to interact with other celltypes such as leukocytes, endothelial, stromal and cancer cells.Platelets can influence tumor development and metastasis formationthrough several processes consisting of the secretion of growthfactors and cytokines and/or via direct interaction with cancer cellsand endothelium. Patients with visceral obesity (VO) are susceptibleto pro-thrombotic and pro-inflammatory states and to cancerdevelopment, especially colon cancer. These findings provide us withthe impetus to analyze the role of platelets isolated from VO patientsin tumor growth and progression with the aim to explore a possiblelink between platelet activation, obesity and colon cancer.