Inducing cell growth arrest and apoptosis by silencing long non-coding RNA PCAT-1 in human bladder cancer.

Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) are a class of non-coding RNAs that play important roles in cancer development and progression. Prostate cancer-associated transcript 1 (PCAT-1) is a novel lncRNA that promotes cell proliferation in prostate cancer. We hypothesized that PCAT-1 also have roles in bladder cancer. In this study, we found that PCAT-1 was up-regulated in bladder cancer compared to paired normal urothelium. Cell proliferation inhibition and apoptosis induction were also observed in PCAT-1 small hairpin RNA (shRNA)-transfected bladder cancer T24 and 5637 cells. Our data suggest that PCAT-1 plays oncogenic roles and can be used as a therapeutic target for treating human bladder cancer.