期刊名称:Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
印刷版ISSN:0027-8424
电子版ISSN:1091-6490
出版年度:2017
卷号:114
期号:21
页码:E4203-E4212
DOI:10.1073/pnas.1620562114
语种:English
出版社:The National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
摘要:Mutated protein-coding genes drive the molecular pathogenesis of many diseases, including cancer. Specifically, mutated KRAS is a documented driver for malignant transformation, occurring early during the pathogenesis of cancers such as lung and pancreatic adenocarcinomas. Therapeutically, the indiscriminate targeting of wild-type and point-mutated transcripts represents an important limitation. Here, we leveraged on the design of miRNA-like artificial molecules (amiRNAs) to specifically target point-mutated genes, such as KRAS, without affecting their wild-type counterparts. Compared with an siRNA-like approach, the requirement of perfect complementarity of the microRNA seed region to a given target sequence in the microRNA/target model has proven to be a more efficient strategy, accomplishing the selective targeting of point-mutated KRAS in vitro and in vivo.