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Table 2 Roles of miRNAs in influencing treatment response in breast cancer by regulating autophagy activities (n = 11)

From: Regulation of autophagy by microRNAs in human breast cancer

Treatment types

Influence on treatment response

miRNA(s)

Autophagy activities ( )

Proposed mechanisms/evidences

References

Chemotherapy

Resistant-promoting

miR-25

miR-25 downregulated ULK1 to suppress autophagy and promote epirubicin resistance in breast cancer cells

[68]

Sensitivity-promoting

miR-27a

miR-27a suppressed LC3-II and p62 expressions to inhibit autophagy and sensitized cancer cells to doxorubicin and paclitaxel

[82]

miR-129-5p

miR-129-5p suppressed HMGB1 to inhibit autophagy and sensitized breast cancer cells to taxol treatment

[61]

miR-489

miR-489 downregulated ULK1 to block autophagy and sensitized breast cancer cells to doxorubicin treatment

[37]

Endocrine therapy

Resistant-promoting

miR-23b-3p

miR-23b-3p downregulated SLC6A14 to promote autophagy and tamoxifen resistance

[75]

miR-21

miR-21 could promote PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway to inhibit autophagy and promote resistance towards both tamoxifen and fulvestrant

[35]

Sensitivity-promoting

miR-101

miR-101 suppressed ATG4D, STMN1 and RAB5A expressions to block autophagy and promote tamoxifen-induced cells death

[80]

Endocrine and chemotherapy

Sensitivity-promoting

miR-125b-5p

miR-125b-5p suppressed PAD2 expression to promote both autophagy and apoptosis. This sensitized cancer cells to both tamoxifen and docetaxel

[66]

Radiotherapy

Sensitivity-promoting

miR-26b

miR-26b downregulated DRAM1 expression to inhibit autophagy and sensitize breast cancer cells to irradiation

[92]

miR-200c

miR-200 downregulated UBQLN1 to block autophagy and sensitized breast cancer cells to irradiation

[93]

Targeted therapy

Sensitivity-promoting

miR-567

miR-567 suppressed autophagy by downregulating ATG5 to sensitize cancer cells to trastuzumab treatment

[78]

  1. 11 miRNAs were reported to play essential roles in regulating treatment responses in breast cancer by modulating the cellular autophagy activities [35, 37, 93, 61, 66, 68, 75, 78, 80, 82, 92]. The treatment responses which could be modulated by these autophagy-regulating miRNAs include responses towards chemotherapy [37, 61, 66, 68, 82], endocrine therapy [35, 66, 75, 80], radiotherapy [92, 93] and targeted therapy [78]. Out of these 11 miRNAs, only two miRNAs, namely, miR-23b-3p [75] and miR-125b-5p [66], were shown to upregulate autophagy activities while the rest were demonstrated to inhibit autophagy [35, 37, 61, 68, 78, 80, 82, 92, 93]. Upregulation; Downregulation