Silencing of HN1L suppresses the proliferation and migration of cancer cells

Background and purpose: HN1L is a member of the HN1 gene family and shares about 30% similarity with HN1 which is another member of the family on the primary protein sequence. Since HN1 is an important gene that is involved in various cellular mechanisms and also differentially expressed in carcinogenesis, we investigated the effect of HN1L on some malignant behaviors of various cancer cells.Material and methods: Co-expression analysis, Gene Ontology enrichment, and database searches were performed to predict the cellular roles of HN1, and to investigate its expression in cancers and their corresponding normal tissues. Western blotting and Real-Time PCR were used to compare the expression of HN1L in the normal prostate cells and prostate cancer cells. Cell proliferation and migration assays were used to investigate the effects of HN1L depletion on cell proliferation and migration.Results: The results of co-expression and Gene Ontology enrichment analyses showed that HN1L is co-expressed with DNA replication and DNA damage response/repair associated genes. The database search results revealed that HN1L expression increases in at least 10 diverse cancer types compared to their normal corresponding tissues. This result was confirmed in the prostate cancer cell model, experimentally. Silencing of HN1L inhibited proliferative and migrative behaviors of prostate, breast, colon, and cervix cancer cells.Conclusions: HN1L probably is a novel proto-oncogene that is involved in the DNA metabolism-related mechanisms, and high HN1L level promotes further proliferation and migration in the cancer cells.