6 MiRNAs are critical components of competing endogenous RNA network in cells.
7 Via binding to complementary sites on mRNA 3ʹUTR, miRNAs promote mRNA degradation or inhibit mRNA translation to repress gene expression.
8 Dysregulation of miRNAs results in abnormal expression of target genes and is associated with cancer development.
9 Hundreds of cancer-associated miRNAs have been reported in colorectal cancer.
10,11 For example, miR-193a-3p, which is downregulated in BRAF-mutated colorectal cancers, inhibits colorectal cancer cell proliferation.
12 MiR-4449 is highly expressed in serum from patients with multiple myeloma compared with samples from healthy volunteers.
13 However, the precise function of miR-4449 in colorectal cancer is not known.