Circ_0003570 Suppresses the progression of hepatocellular carcinoma through miR-182-5p/STARD13 regulatory axis

BACKGROUND: Emerging evidence have revealed that circRNAs exert important biological effects in the development and progression of various diseases, including cancer. Our study aimed to elaborated the biological effects of hsa-circ_0003570 in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) development at the molecular level. RESULTS: The results of functional experiments showed that knockdown of circ_0003570 induced HCC cell growth, migration and invasion, whereas overexpression of circ_0003570 presented the opposite effects. In vivo experiments, xenograft tumors grown from circ-overexpressed cells had smaller tumor volume and weight than the control group. Further investigations suggested that circ_0003570 may function as a competing endogenous RNA via competitively binding miR-182-5p and thereby regulating the repression of downstream target gene STARD13, which were demonstrated by dual luciferase reporter assay and functional rescued experiments. CONCLUSIONS: Taken together, circ_0003570 suppresses the development of HCC by modulating miR-182-5p/STARD13 axis. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12575-022-00176-w.