Rojas E
Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, Mexico
Title: mRNA and miRNA expression patterns associated to pathways linked to metal mixture health effects
Biography
Biography: Rojas E
Abstract
Metals are a major category of globally distributed pollutants that tend to accumulate in select tissues. Metal mixtures are a potential threat to human health by increasing disease risk. Recently, experimental data have linked altered miRNA expression with exposure to several metals, including As, Cd and Pb. Although, several human populations are exposed to low concentrations of As-Cd-Pb mixture, there are few data at respect to miRNA expression patterns. Thus, this study aims to evaluate global miRNA and mRNA expression changes induced by a metal mixture (NaAsO2, CdCl2 and Pb(C2H3O2)2•3H2O) to explore the role of miRNA-222 as a post-transcriptional regulator of RAD51C, a gene involved in homologous recombination of double-strand break DNA repair. Our results show that miRNA expression profi le responsible for the mRNA expression changes induced by metal mixture exposure are involved in cellular processes, including DNA repair, cell death, growth and proliferation related to the metal-associated pathologies (cardiovascular diseases and cancer). On the other hand, we found that miR-222 directly negatively regulates RAD51C expression and impairs homologous recombination of double-strand break DNA repair, generating genetic instability that could be related with cell transformation.