MicroRNAs regulate cancer stem cells

BOSTON, Dec. 13 (UPI) -- U.S. and Chinese researchers say they've discovered a key molecular switch belonging to a class of molecules called microRNAs that regulate cancer stem cells.

A report, published in the journal Cell, said the microRNAs push the stem cells to become more differentiated and less tumorigenic through their ability to switch off particular genes.

"People know that microRNAs are important regulators of cell differentiation, but nobody has shown that they regulate the critical properties of cancer stem cells, or any kind of stem cells," Judy Lieberman -- an investigator at the Immune Disease Institute and Harvard Medical School professor of pediatrics at Children's Hospital Boston -- said Thursday in a release.

The report said the findings suggest a novel way to target these cells to treat cancer with therapeutic RNAs, which are a new class of medicine under development for many diseases.