Up-regulation of BRCA1-associated RING Domain 1 Promotes Hepatocellular Carcinoma Progression by Targeting Akt Signaling

The present study was designed to investigate the potential clinical, pathological, prognostic value, role and mechanism of BRCA1-associated RING Domain 1 (BARD1) in Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Quantitative real-time PCR and immunohistochemistry were performed to evaluate the expression of BARD1 mRNA and protein. The expression of BARD1 in the HCC tissue samples was markedly higher than that in the adjacent noncancerous liver tissues. Elevated BARD1 expression was positively correlated with tumor-node-metastasis stage, Barcelona-Clinic Liver Cancer stage, hepatitis B surface antigen, large tumor size, serum alpha-fetoprotein levels, and serum aspartate aminotransferase levels. Univariate and multivariate analyses revealed the BARD1 was an independent predictor for decreased progression-free survival and overall survival in HCC. In vitro experiments demonstrated that knocking down BARD1 significantly inhibited the proliferation, invasion and migration of HCC cells. Moreover, silencing BARD1 inhibit the signaling pathway via decreased the levels of Akt, mTOR, and MMP-9 and inhibited the phosphorylation of Akt (Ser473) and mTOR (Ser2248). Collectively, our findings suggest that BARD1 may be a novel diagnostic and prognostic biomarker of HCC, and up-regulation of BARD1 can contribute to HCC progression by targeting Akt signaling.