miR-193a-3p regulates the multi-drug resistance of bladder cancer by targeting the LOXL4 gene and the Oxidative Stress pathway

BACKGROUND: Chemoresistance is a major obstacle to the curative cancer chemotherapy and presents one of the most formidable challenges in both research and management of cancer. RESULTS: From the detailed studies of a multi-chemosensitive (5637) versus a chemoresistant (H-bc) bladder cancer cell lines, we showed that miR-193a-3p [GenBank: NR_029710.1] promotes the multi-chemoresistance of bladder cancer cells. We further demonstrated that lysyl oxidase-like 4 (LOXL4) gene [GenBank: NM_032211.6] is a direct target of miR-193a-3p and executes the former’s impact on bladder cancer chemoresistance. The Oxidative Stress pathway activity is drastically affected by a forced reversal of miR-193a-3p or LOXL4 levels in cell and may act at the downstream of LOXL4 gene to relay the miR-193a-3p’s impact on the multi-chemoresistance in both cultured cells and the tumor xenografts in nude mice. CONCLUSIONS: In addition to a new mechanistic insight, our results provide a set of the essential genes in this newly identified miR-193a-3p/LOXL4/Oxidative Stress axis as the diagnostic targets for a guided anti-bladder cancer chemotherapy. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/1476-4598-13-234) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.