Table 2.

Examples of deregulated expression of small ncRNAs in HCC.

Clinical Samples Used	ncRNA	Genomic Location	Expression Level	Function	References
21 normal livers, 104 HCC, 90 paired cirrhotic tissues and 35 HCC-derived cell lines [80]	miR-21	17q23.2	Up-regulated	Targets many tumor suppressor genes, most importantly PTEN activating PI3K/AKT pathway	[80,81,82,83,84]
21 normal livers, 104 HCC, 90 paired cirrhotic tissues and 35 HCC-derived cell lines [80]	miR-221	Xp11.3	Up-regulated	Targets many tumor suppressor genes, such as p27, p57 that regulate cell cycle	[80,85,86,87,88,89]
20 HCC tissues and pair-matched normal liver tissues [90]	miR-155	21q21.3	Up-regulated	Targets APC to activate Wnt/β-catenin pathway and SOCS1 to activate STAT3 signaling, as well as C/EBPβ	[90,91,92,93]
17 HCC and 21 cirrhotic liver tissues [76]	miR-122	18q21.31	Down-regulated	Targets many genes regulating lipid metabolism, inflammation and fibrosis contributing to steatohepatitis and HCC	[76,94,95,96,97]
17 pairs of HCC and adjacent normal liver [102]	miR-29	7q32. 3	Down-regulated	Promotes apoptosis By targeting Mcl-1 and Bcl-2, changes DNA methylation by targeting DNMT3A	[102,103]
38 HCC and paired normal liver samples [104]	miR-101	1p31.3	Down-regulated	Targets many oncogenes, such as Mcl-1, JunB, Rock2	[104,105,106,107]
20 paired HCC and non-tumor tissues [109]	let-7 family	Multiple chromosomes	Down-regulated	Targets RAS, STAT3, many genes regulating fibrosis	[109,110,111,112]
14 paired HCC and non-tumor tissues [114]	miR-15 family	17p13.1	Down-regulated	Targets IKKα and TAB3 to inhibit NF-κB, VEGF to inhibit angiogenesis	[114,115,116]
30 HCC and 28 liver samples [119]	SNORD126	14q11.2	Up-regulated	Activates PI3K–AKT pathway through FGFR2	[119]
13 pair-matched HCC and normal tissues [124]	SNORA24	4q26	Down-regulated	Perturbation of ribosomal function	[124]
112 pairs of human HBV-associated HCC and adjacent non-tumor tissues [125]	SNORD113-1	14q32	Down-regulated	Suppresses HCC tumorigenesis in MAPK/ERK and TGF-β pathway-dependent mechanisms	[125]
73 pairs of HCC and adjacent non-tumor tissue [129]	piR-Hep1	1q24.2	Up-regulated	Promote cell proliferation and invasion via activating PI3K/AKT signaling pathway	[129]