• Guangzao Li, Renpeng Zhou, Qi Zhang, Banghong Jiang, Qingkai Wu, and Chen Wang.
• Department of Plastic Surgery, 1st Affiliated Hospital of Bengbu Medical College, 287 Chang Huai Road, Bengbu, Anhui 233000, PR China.
• Exp. Cell Res. 2016 Jul 1; 345 (1): 93-9.

AbstractHypertrophic scar (HS) is a fibroproliferative disorder caused by abnormal wound healing, which is characterized by excessive deposition of extracellular matrix (ECM) secreted by fibroblasts. We previous have found that expression of microRNA-21(miR-21) was increased in tissues and fibroblasts of HS. However, the underlying molecular mechanism remains to be further elucidated. In this study, we identified the miR-21 was a marker for the phenotype of HS fibroblasts, as anti-miR-21 reduced expression of fibrosis markers such as Col1A1, Col3A1, Fn and α-SMA in fibroblasts and overexpression of miR-21 promoted fibroproliferative expression in fibroblasts. Furthermore, we also found that miR-21 promoted TGF-β1 induced fibroproliferative expression by repressing Smad7 expression in vitro. In addition, the miR-21 inhibitor inhibited the growth of hypertrophic scar tissue in vivo (nude mice experimental model). These results indicated that miR-21 was a critical regulator for HS formation and TGF- β1/miR-21/Smad7 pathway could be a useful therapeutic target for the treatment of HS.Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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