Overexpression and Clinicopathological Correlation of Long Noncoding RNA TMPO-AS1 in Colorectal Cancer Patients

Purpose Long noncoding RNA (lncRNA) has been identified as an important modulator of gene expression and other activities of the cells. This kind of genes also has a significant role in the growth and development of human cancers, including colorectal cancer (CRC). Among lncRNAs, thymopoietin (TMPO)-antisense RNA 1 (TMPO-AS1) is of particular significance and might have a role in CRC regulation. The current study aimed to determine the involvement of TMPO-AS1 in CRC patients. Methods In this study, 50 pairs of tumor and tumor marginal samples of CRC patients were investigated to assess the expression level of TMPO-AS1 in this cancer. For this purpose, the total RNA was isolated from the tissues using the TRIzol RNA extraction method, and after synthesis of the complementary DNA, the TMPO-AS1 expression was measured by quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) technique. In addition, clinicopathological characteristics of the CRC patients were analyzed in the study groups. Results The findings demonstrated the overexpression of TMPO-AS1 in CRC tissues. Interestingly, the expression level of TMPO-AS1 was significantly correlated with clinicopathological features of the patients such as lymph node and distant metastasis. Conclusion The overexpression of TMPO-AS1 gene in CRC suggests that this lncRNA and its underlying signaling pathways can be considered a prognostic tumor marker and may pave the way for the future development of novel therapeutic options for CRC.