Abstract: Objective To investigate the effect of lncRNA HOXB-AS3 on cell proliferation, apoptosis and invasion in acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and the underlying mechanism. Methods The expression level of lncRNA HOXB-AS3 in bone marrow mononuclear cells ( BMMCs) of AML patients and the AML cell lines were detected by RT-qPCR. THP1 and HL60 cell lines stably expressed shRNA-HOXB-AS3-01, shRNA-HOXB-AS3-02 or shRNA-HOXB-AS3-03 were established by lentivirus transfection. CCK-8 assay, EdU assay, flow cytometry, and transwell assay were used to measure the cell viability, proliferation, apoptosis and invasion, Western blotting was employed to detect the protein levels. The AML nude mouse xenograft model was established to verify the effect of low expression level of HOXB-AS3 on the tumor growth in vivo. Results The expression level of lncRNA HOXB-AS3 in AML BMMCs and cell lines was increased significantly. The low expression of HOXB-AS3 significantly inhibited the cell viability, proliferation, and invasion of THP1 and HL60 cells, enhanced the apoptosis, up-regulated the expression levels of cleaved caspase-3, cleaved caspase-9 and E-cadherin, and down-regulated the expression levels of N-cadherin, VEGF, PI3Kp85α and p-AKT. The low expression of HOXB-AS3 significantly inhibited the tumor growth, and down-regulated the expression level of PI3Kp85α and p-AKT In vivo. Conclusion lncRNA HOXB-AS3 aggravates the proliferation, apoptosis and invasion of AML cells by activating the PI3K-AKT pathway.

Key words: lncRNA HOXB-AS3, acute myeloid leukemia, proliferation, apoptosis, invasion, PI3K-AKT pathway