Microchromosome maintenance protein 7 (MCM7), a DNA replication permitting factor, plays an essential role in initiating DNA replication. MCM7 is reported to be involved in tumor formation and progression, whereas the expression profile and molecular function of MCM7 in colorectal cancer (CRC) remain unknown. In this study, we aimed to evaluate the clinical significance and biological function of MCM7 in CRC and investigated whether MCM7 can be used for a differential diagnosis in CRC and whether it may serve as a more sensitive proliferation marker for CRC evaluation. Moreover, immunohistochemical analysis of MCM7 was performed in a total of 89 specimens, and high MCM7 expression levels were associated with worse overall survival (OS) in CRC patients. Furthermore, the cell functional test suggested that lentivirus-mediated silencing of MCM7 with shRNA in CRC cells significantly inhibited cellular proliferation and promoted apoptosis in vitro and inhibited tumor growth in vivo. Additionally, mechanistic studies further demonstrated that P21-activated protein kinase 2 (PAK2) was regulated by MCM7 via microarray analysis and cell functional recovery tests, and miR-107 played a role in regulating expression MCM7 via miRNA microarray analysis and 3'UTR reporter assays. Taken together, our results suggest that the miR-107/MCM7/PAK2 pathway may participate in cancer progression and that MCM7 may serve as a prognostic biomarker in CRC.
Keywords: Colorectal cancer (CRC); MCM7; PAK2; miR-107.
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