Downregulation of MiR-31 stimulates expression of LATS2 via the hippo pathway and promotes epithelial-mesenchymal transition in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma

BACKGROUND: Dysregulation of miRNAs is associated with cancer development by coordinately suppressing abundant target genes. Emerging evidence indicates that miR-31 plays a dual role in tumorigenicity. However, whether miR-31 plays as an oncogene in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) and the potential target molecules are still unclear. MiR-31 role in ESCC was investigated and an association of the target molecules with EMT was identified in the progression of ESCC. METHODS: Western blot assays and qRT-PCR was performed to detect the protein and mRNA levels. We investigated the role of miR-31 in the regulation of LATS2 expression in ESCC cell lines via functional assays both in vivo and in vitro. The luciferase reporter assays was conducted to confirm LATS2 is a potential target of miR-31. Immunohistochemistry was used to measure LATS2 and TAZ expression in normal and ESCC tissue. RESULTS: LATS2 is a component of the Hippo tumor-suppressive signaling pathway. Frequent loss of heterozygosity of LATS2 has been reported in esophageal cancer. We analyzed the reciprocal expression regulation of miR-31 and LATS2 and demonstrated that LATS2 expression was elevated by down-regulation of miR-31 at the post-transcriptional level in ESCC. Moreover, miR-31 significantly suppressed the luciferase activity of mRNA combined with the LATS2 3′-UTR, a key molecule in the Hippo pathway. Then, LATS2 consequently promoted the translocation of TAZ, which was examined using immunohistochemistry. Silencing of miR-31 significantly inhibited the cell proliferation, induced apoptosis and decreased the ability of migration/invasion in vitro. LATS2 impedes ESCC cell proliferation and invasion by suppressing miR-31, as well as mice xenograft model in vivo. Meanwhile, the nuclear localization of LATS2 constrained the phosphorylation of TAZ. Then, the expression level of TAZ was notably heightened with a high risk of recurrence compared to that observed in the low-risk patients, as well as, the higher expression associated with a poor survival. CONCLUSIONS: Our study demonstrated that overexpression of miR-31 undertook an oncogenic role in ESCC by repressing expression of LATS2 via the Hippo Pathway and activating epithelial-mesenchymal transition. LATS2 and TAZ could be potential novel molecular markers for predicting the risk of recurrence and prognosis of ESCC. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s13046-017-0622-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.