miR-142-3p as a Candidate Biomarker for Early-Stage Lung Adenocarcinoma: Integrative Bioinformatics Analysis and experimental Validation

Early-stage lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD) diagnosis is a clinical challenge. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are identified as candidate biomarkers due to their regulatory role in cancer development. In this study, we performed a systematic analysis according to The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) to identify differentially expressed miRNAs and mRNAs in LUAD. This was followed by network construction. We created a lncRNA-miRNA-mRNA regulatory network by identifying differentially expressed miRNAs and their target genes using information from TCGA, miR-TV database, and miRNET tool. miR-142-3p was identified as a candidate biomarker associated with LUAD development and patient survival. Our ceRNA network analysis identified four lncRNAs-LINC00689, MAGI2-AS3, DUBR, and LINC01719-as potential sponges of miR-142-3p in LUAD. RT-qPCR validation in paired tumors and adjacent normal tissues exhibited significantly higher expression of miR-142-3p in LUAD tissues. miR-142-3p also showed diagnostic potential through receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis (AUC = 0.8481). All the results implied that miR-142-3p can be a candidate biomarker for the early detection and diagnosis of LUAD.