GAS5 oligonucleotides as therapeutic agents in breast cancer

Although relatively less is known about the long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) than the essential protein coding genes, several of them have organismal functions such as lethal knockouts, apoptosis etc. (1,2). Growth arrest specific genes 5 (GAS5) has proven to be pro-apoptotic in breast cancer (BC) cell lines (3). In their paper entitled “The hormone response element mimic sequence of GAS5 lncRNA is sufficient to induce apoptosis in breast cancer cells” published in March issue of Oncotarget by Pickard and Williams (4) report that an oligonucleotide representing the hormone response element mimic (HREM) sequence within GAS5 alone is able to promote the apoptosis of BC cells similar to full-length GAS5.