LncRNA ADAMTS9-AS2 regulates ovarian cancer progression by targeting miR-182-5p/FOXF2 signaling pathway

Increasing studies revealed that aberrant expression of long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) play critical roles in ovarian cancer (OC) progression. However, the roles and underlying mechanisms of ADAMTS9-AS2 in OC remain unclear. In the present study, we showed that ADAMTS9-AS2 expression was significantly decreased in OC tissues and cell lines. Low ADAMTS9-AS2 expression was correlated with advanced FIGO stage, lymph-node metastasis, and poor overall survival of OC patients. Function assays showed that ADAMTS9-AS2 reduced OC cells proliferation, invasion, and epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) processes in vitro and restrained tumor growth in vivo. The underlying mechanism studies indicated that ADAMTS9-AS2 functioned as a competing endogenous RNA (ceRNA) for miR-182-5p to promote cell proliferation and invasion. In addition, we revealed that FOXF2 acted as a direct target of miR-182-5p and mediated the effects of ADAMTS9-AS2 on OC cells progression. Taken together, our data suggested that lncRNA ADAMTS9-AS2 decreased OC progression by regulating miR-182-5p/FOXF2 axis, indicating ADAMTS9-AS2 could serve as a potential therapeutic target for OC treatment.