In the last several years, bone tumor related microRNA research showed an explosive growth. MicroRNA was found to have a high or low expression level in bone tumor tissue and some microRNAs proved to be the biomarker for poor prognosis. The majority of research was focused on osteosarcoma and Ewing sarcoma. Many tumor associated molecules, including oncogenes and tumor suppressor genes, were found to be the direct targets for microRNA, and enhanced microRNA may play the regulatory role in tumor development. In the bone tumor cell lines, overexpression of microRNA could promote or inhibit the tumor growth, migration, invasion, and metastasis, especially for osteosarcoma and Ewing sarcoma. Many key molecules proved important for tumor genesis were found directly binding to the related microRNA, and whose expression level was down regulated. This may provide a novel therapeutic target for bone tumor. Large scale clinical samples detection and high through-put microarray assay have demonstrated microRNA might be applied to predict and diagnose the bone tumor. MicroRNA in serum was also proved significant as a biomarker for bone tumor.
Keywords: Bone tumor, Ewing sarcoma, microRNA, osteosarcoma.