Increased expression of long non-coding RNA SNHG16 correlates with tumor progression and poor prognosis in non-small cell lung cancer

In this study, we report that lncRNA SNHG16 is upregulated in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) tissues, and correlates with tumor size, TNM stage and lymph node metastasis. Kaplan-Meier analysis shows that the patients with high SNHG16 expression have poorer disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) than the patients with low SNHG16 expression. Multivariate Cox regression analysis reveals that SNHG16 expression could be regarded as an independent predictor for DFS and OS in NSCLC patients. Cell experiments show that SNHG16 promotes NSCLC cell proliferation, migration and invasion. miR-146a is further identified and confirmed to be the target of SNHG16, and SNHG16 functions by targeting miR-146a. Subsequently, MUC5AC, a major mucin in the human respiratory tract correlated with post-operative metastasis and recurrence of NSCLC, is confirmed to be regulated by SNHG16 and miR-146a, and plays a positive role in promoting cell proliferation, migration and invasion, which might be involved in the oncogenic activity of SNHG16-miR-146a axis in NSCLC. Animal experiments also confirm these conclusions. Collectively, these results elucidate a potential mechanism underlying the carcinogenesis role of SNHG16 in NSCLC, and indicate that SNHG16 could act as a novel promising marker for prognosis, and a potential therapeutic target for NSCLC treatment.