Overexpression of Axl has been noted to correlate with several human cancers. However, the regulatory mechanisms and effects of Axl in human neuroblastoma development remain unclear. Here, we explore the expression of Axl in neurobalstoma and related upstream regulatory mechanisms of invasion and migration. We found that Axl was overexpressed in metastatic neuroblastoma tissues and positively associated with long non-coding RNA metastasis-associated lung adenocarcinoma transcript 1. Meanwhile, our data suggested that metastasis-associated lung adenocarcinoma transcript 1 upregulated Axl expression in neuroblastoma cells, resulting in cell invasion and migration. Furthermore, we found that targeting Axl by inhibitor R428 significantly suppressed the abilities of tumor cell invasion and migration. In summary, these results suggested that Axl, which is regulated by long non-coding RNA metastasis-associated lung adenocarcinoma transcript 1, may exert great influence on invasion and migration of neuroblastoma.
Keywords: Axl; invasion; metastasis-associated lung adenocarcinoma transcript 1; migration; neuroblastoma.