NON-CODING RNAs AS EMERGING BIOMARKERS AND THERAPEUTIC TARGETS IN CANCER AND INFLAMMATORY DISEASE

Abstract

The recognition that the majority of the human genome is transcribed into RNA molecules that never encode protein has reshaped understanding of gene regulation over the past two decades, and this expanding non-coding transcriptome, encompassing microRNAs, long non-coding RNAs, and circular RNAs, is now understood to intersect major cellular pathways including MAPK, Wnt, and PI3K/AKT/mTOR signaling, thereby influencing proliferation, apoptosis, and immune responses relevant to both malignant and inflammatory disease processes [1]. Long non-coding RNAs specifically, defined as non-coding transcripts exceeding two hundred nucleotides in length, number approximately thirty thousand in human tissues and display markedly tissue-specific expression patterns, a property that has attracted particular interest for their potential as diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers across neurological, cardiac, pulmonary, and hepatic disease in addition to cancer [2].