LINC01225 promotes occurrence and metastasis of hepatocellular carcinoma in an epidermal growth factor receptor-dependent pathway

The long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) have long been clarified to participate in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) as a biomarker. We carried out the present study in order to identify HCC-related lncRNAs and elucidate the functional roles in the development and progression of HCC. Our previous study has provided that LINC01225 may be an HCC-related gene. Here, we verified that LINC01225 was upregulated in HCC. Knockdown of LINC01225 resulted in inhibited cell proliferation and invasion with activated apoptosis and cell cycle arrest in vitro. Overexpression of LINC01225 in LINC01225 knockdown cells presented that attenuated cell proliferation and invasion were restored and enhanced. Subcutaneous and tail vein/intraperitoneal injection xenotransplantation model in vivo validated reduced tumor progression and metastasis. Investigation of mechanism found that LINC01225 could bind to epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) and increase the protein level of EGFR, and subsequently fine tune the EGFR/Ras/Raf-1/MEK/MAPK signaling pathway. Analysis with clinicopathological information suggested a high expression of LINC01225 is positively associated with poor prognosis. We also proved that LINC01225 was stably expressed in serum and can act as a novel biomarker in predicting the diagnosis of HCC. As a conclusion, LINC01225 plays a crucial role in HCC and can act as a biomarker for the diagnosis and prognosis of HCC.