MiR-129-5p Inactivates NF-κB Pathway to Block Rheumatoid Arthritis Development via Targeting BRD4

Abstract

Object. Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an osteoarticular disease which seriously affects the motor abilities of the patients. MicroRNA disorder has been confirmed as a biomarker event in RA development, and several studies have identified that miR-129-5p is related with the progression of multiple bone diseases. The study attempted to investigate the regulation mechanism of miR-129-5p in RA development. Methods. The abundance of miR-129-5p was detected in the samples including normal tissues and RA tissues and cell lines including human fibroblast-like synoviocytes (hFLSs) and human rheumatoid arthritis fibroblast-like synoviocytes (RA-FLSs). The CCK-8 assay, flow cytometry, Transwell, and ELISA were used to observe the effects of miR-129-5p on the phenotype of RA-FLSs. Moreover, the potential targets of miR-129-5p were identified with TargetScan and dual-luciferase reporter gene assay. Besides, the abundances of the proteins were analyzed with western blot. Results. Decreased miR-129-5p was observed in RA tissues and cells. Increased miR-129-5p obviously blocked the proliferation, inflammatory stress, and migration and remarkably promoted cellular apoptosis. Moreover, BRD4 was confirmed as targets of miR-129-5p, and BRD4 upregulation could partly rescue the inhibition of miR-129-5p on aggressive behaviors of RA-FLSs. Besides, the finding of this study also proved that upregulated miR-129-5p could impede the NF-κB pathway via targeting BRD4. Conclusion. This study suggests that miR-129-5p suppresses the activation of NF-κB pathway to block the progression of RA via targeting BRD4.