In subcutaneous tumors of mice injected with sh-control or sh-ATB cells. Data are presented as mean ?s.d. from three independent experiments. **P < 0.01 vs. sh-control groupinteraction network of competitive endogenous RNAs (ceRNAs), in which lncRNAs may exert functions through targeting miRNAs and regulating their function role [19, 33]. ATB could promote the invasionmetastasis cascade in HCC by negative regulating of miR-200 family [13]. Previous study showed that downregulation of miR-200a promoted glioma malignancy by up-regulating SIM2-s [18]. Our present study confirmed that miR-200a was significantly decreased in glioma tissues and inversely correlated with ATB. To explore whether ATB has miR-200a binding site in glioma cells, and PubMed ID:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28461585 was confirmed by luciferase reporter assays and RIP. We verified that ATB is directly bound to miR-200a on ATB transcript. RNA-IP assay showed that the expression of ATB immunoprecipitated with in the miR-200a overexpression group was significantly increased. Meanwhile, we found that ATB exerted the function of antitumor by miR-200a in glioma cells. Taken all together, these data strongly suggested that ATB directly targets miR-200a and affects the biological characteristic of glioma cells by negatively regulating miR-200a. The transforming growth factor-2 (TGF-2) belongs to TGF- family, functioned as an oncogene in several cancer types, which promote cancer cells, malignant behaviors [34]. Recent study has reported that miR-200a suppresses renal cell carcinoma development by directly targeting TGF-2 [35] and miR-200a prevents renal fibrogenesis by suppressing of TGF-2 [36]. Consistent with previous studies, we confirmed that miR-200a regulated the expression of TGF-2 via targeting the 3UTR of TGF-2.Emerging evidences indicated that lncRNAs play a critical role in a variety of cellar biological processes by acting as a ceRNA or a molecular sponge in modulating the role and functions of miRNAs [30, 37]. These lncRNAs act as a natural miRNA sponge to control endogenous miRNAs by using shared miRNAs responsive elements (MREs) and then modulating the derepression of these miRNAs targets via post-transcriptional regulation [38]. For instance, HOTAIR, a well-known lncRNA could inhibit the expression of FGF1 by regulating miR326 in human glioma [39], and also functioned as a competing endogenous RNA to regulate HER2 expression by sponging miR-331-3p in promoting gastric cancer [40]. To further explore whether TGF-2 is involved in the ATB acts as a ceRNA in regulating the biological characteristics of glioma by modulating miR-200a. We demonstrated that miR-200a reversed the reduction of TGF-2 mediated by ATB knockdown. In addition, we found that TGF-2 expression was negatively correlated with miR-200a, but positively associated with ATB in glioma tissues. These results suggested that ATB functions as a ceRNA via decreasing miR-200a, up-regulating TGF-2 in human glioma.Conclusion In summary, we first reported that ATB was purchase Nectrolide highly expressed in glioma tissues and acted as an oncogene, which serves a key function in regulating glioma malignancy. ATB knockdown suppressed glioma biological characteristics by directly targeting miR-200a andMa et al. Journal of Experimental Clinical Cancer Research (2016) 35:Page 12 ofnegatively regulating its expression in glioma cells. TGF-2, a target oncogene, is directly bound to tumor-suppressor gene miR-200a and is involved in ATB function as a ceRNA for miR-200a in glioma. Ther.