Involvement of Differentially Expressed microRNAs in the PEGylated Liposome Encapsulated (188)Rhenium-Mediated Suppression of Orthotopic Hypopharyngeal Tumor

Hypopharyngeal cancer (HPC) accounts for the lowest survival rate among all types of head and neck cancers (HNSCC). However, the therapeutic approach for HPC still needs to be investigated. In this study, a theranostic (188)Re-liposome was prepared to treat orthotopic HPC tumors and analyze the deregulated microRNA expressive profiles. The therapeutic efficacy of (188)Re-liposome on HPC tumors was evaluated using bioluminescent imaging followed by next generation sequencing (NGS) analysis, in order to address the deregulated microRNAs and associated signaling pathways. The differentially expressed microRNAs were also confirmed using clinical HNSCC samples and clinical information from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database. Repeated doses of (188)Re-liposome were administrated to tumor-bearing mice, and the tumor growth was apparently suppressed after treatment. For NGS analysis, 13 and 9 microRNAs were respectively up-regulated and down-regulated when the cutoffs of fold change were set to 5. Additionally, miR-206-3p and miR-142-5p represented the highest fold of up-regulation and down-regulation by (188)Re-liposome, respectively. According to Differentially Expressed MiRNAs in human Cancers (dbDEMC) analysis, most of (188)Re-liposome up-regulated microRNAs were categorized as tumor suppressors, while down-regulated microRNAs were oncogenic. The KEGG pathway analysis showed that cancer-related pathways and olfactory and taste transduction accounted for the top pathways affected by (188)Re-liposome. (188)Re-liposome down-regulated microRNAs, including miR-143, miR-6723, miR-944, and miR-136 were associated with lower survival rates at a high expressive level. (188)Re-liposome could suppress the HPC tumors in vivo, and the therapeutic efficacy was associated with the deregulation of microRNAs that could be considered as a prognostic factor.