BACKGROUND: lncRNA AGAP2-AS1 has been reported to promote several types of cancers, but its involvement in ovarian carcinoma (OC) is unknown. Our study was carried out to investigate the potential involvement of AGAP2-AS1 in OC.

MATERIAL AND METHODS: We enrolled 82 patients with ovarian carcinoma. Quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) was performed to analyze lncRNA AGAP2-AS1 expression in ovarian carcinoma and proliferation assays were performed.

RESULTS: We found AGAP2-AS1 was upregulated in OC tissues compared to adjacent healthy tissues, and expression levels of AGAP2-AS1 increased with increased clinical stages. lncRNA MEG3 was downregulated in OC tissues and was inversely correlated with AGAP2-AS1. AGAP2-AS1 overexpression led to downregulation of MEG3, while MEG3 overexpression failed to affect AGAP2-AS1. AGAP2-AS1 overexpression promoted proliferation of OC cells, while MEG3 overexpression inhibited proliferation of OC cells. In addition, MEG3 overexpression attenuated the effects of AGAP2-AS1 overexpression on cancer cell proliferation, but AGAP2-AS1 overexpression did not obviously affect cancer cell invasion and migration.

CONCLUSIONS: lncRNA AGAP2-AS1 is upregulated in ovarian carcinoma and negatively regulates lncRNA MEG3 to participate in the regulation of cancer cell proliferation.

Keywords: Ovarian Neoplasms, Down-Regulation, transcriptional activation