RUNX3-mediated up-regulation of miR-29b suppresses the proliferation and migration of gastric cancer cells by targeting KDM2A

RUNX3 is a transcriptional factor that has been shown to regulate protein-coding gene expression at the transcriptional level. However, the regulation of RUNX3 on miRNAs is not fully understood. In this study, we used miRNA microarray to identify the miRNAs that are regulated by RUNX3 and found that miR-29b showed the most up-regulation in RUNX3 over-expressed cells compared with the control cells. We used qRT-PCR to confirm the miRNA microarray results in several gastric cancer cells and found that RUNX3 could bind to the miR-29b promoter directly and cooperate with Smad3 to increase the promoter activity of miR-29b. In the clinical setting, both RUNX3 and miR-29b are down-regulated significantly in human gastric cancer tissues. A positive correlation between miR-29b and RUNX3 was found in the gastric cancer tissues. Additionally, we found that miR-29b suppressed the proliferation and metastasis of gastric cancer cells by directly targeting KDM2A. The miR-29b/KDM2A axis was involved in the RUNX3-mediated inhibition of gastric cancer cell proliferation and metastasis. Taken together, our results suggested that RUNX3-mediated up-regulation of miR-29b inhibited the proliferation and migration of gastric cancer cells by targeting KDM2A, representing a novel molecular mechanism for the tumor suppression action of RUNX3.