MicroRNA-340-5p suppressed rheumatoid arthritis synovial fibroblast proliferation and induces apoptotic cell number by targeting signal transducers and activators of transcription 3

Abstract

Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic systemic autoimmune disease. In this study, the role of microRNA-340-5p in rheumatoid arthritis was investigated. qRT-PCR was used to detect the expression of microRNA-340-5p in serums, synovial tissues, and fibroblast-like synoviocytes from patients and healthy participants. Cell proliferation rate, cell cycle and apoptotic cell numbers were measured by CCK-8 and flow cytometry assays. The expression of pro-inflammation factors was determined by ELISA. Our data showed that the expression of microRNA-340-5p was greatly suppressed in rheumatoid arthritis serums, synovial tissues and rheumatoid arthritis-fibroblast-like synoviocytes compared to that in healthy controls. Over-expression of microRNA-340-5p greatly suppressed cell proliferation, promoted cell apoptosis, and suppressed the expression of inflammation factors in rheumatoid arthritis fibroblast-like synoviocytes. Additionally, STAT3 was a target of microRNA-340-5. Overexpression of STAT3 could reverse the outcome of microRNA-340-5p on cell proliferation and apoptosis in rheumatoid arthritis fibroblast-like synoviocytes. The findings in our study demonstrated that microRNA-340-5p may serve as a potential target for therapeutic direction for patients with rheumatoid arthritis.

Keywords:

• MiRNA-340-5p
• rheumatoid arthritis
• STAT3
• rheumatoid arthritis fibroblast-like synoviocytes

Ethical approval

Ethical approval was obtained from the Ethics Committee of Shunde Hospital of Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine. Written informed consent was obtained from all individual patients included in the study.

Author contributions

DWW and MC: study concepts, study design, literature research, experimental studies, manuscript preparation and editing; SBZ and TTM: definition of intellectual content, literature research experimental studies, manuscript preparation and editing; CZT, SDL and XDC: literature research, experiments work and manuscript writing. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

We thank the financial support from the Science and Technology Development Fund, Macau SAR (File no. 0010/2019/A).