Tumor-suppressive function of long noncoding RNA MALAT1 in glioma cells by downregulation of MMP2 and inactivation of ERK/MAPK signaling

Metastasis-associated lung adenocarcinoma transcript 1 (MALAT1) is a type of long noncoding RNA. It is associated with metastasis and is a favorable prognostic factor for lung cancer. Recent studies have shown that MALAT1 plays an important role in other malignancies. But, little is known about the role of MALAT1 in glioma. In this study, quantitative reverse transcription PCR (qRT-PCR) was used to demonstrate that the expression of MALAT1 was lower than that in normal brain tissues. Stable RNA interference-mediated knockdown of MALAT1 in human glioma cell lines (U87 and U251) significantly promoted the invasion and proliferation of the glioma cells by in vitro assays. Conversely, overexpression of MALAT1 caused significant reduction in cell proliferation and invasion in vitro, and tumorigenicity in both subcutaneous and intracranial human glioma xenograft models. Furthermore, MALAT1-mediated tumor suppression in glioma cells may be via reduction of extracellular signal-regulated kinase/mitogen-activated protein kinase (ERK/MAPK) signaling activity and expression of matrix metalloproteinase 2 (MMP2). In conclusion, overall data demonstrated the tumor-suppressive role of MALAT1 in glioma by attenuating ERK/MAPK-mediated growth and MMP2-mediated invasiveness.