Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) still lacks valuable diagnostic and prognostic tools. This study aimed to investigate the potential diagnostic and prognostic value of baseline interleukin (IL)-10, fatty acid-binding protein 2 (FABP2) and lipopolysaccharide (LPS) levels in patients with HCC. Serum levels of IL-10, FABP2 and LPS in 47 newly diagnosed HCC patients and 50 healthy individuals were estimated and compared. The best cut-off points for baseline IL-10, FABP2 and LPS levels predicting overall survival (OS) were evaluated. Both levels of FABP2 and IL-10 were significantly higher in HCC patients vs. control group (median 2095 vs. 1772 pg/mL, p = 0.026; 9.94 vs. 4.89 pg/mL, p < 0.001) and may serve as potential biomarkers in complex HCC diagnostic tools. The cut-off value of 2479 pg/mL for FABP2 was determined to have the highest sensitivity (66.7%) and specificity (55.6%) to distinguish patients with a median OS longer than 17 months. However, the median OS of patients with high and low levels of FABP2 were not significantly different (p = 0.896). The prognostic value of LPS as well as FABP2 and IL-10 for HCC patients appears to be limited.

Introduction: Early diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) as well as evaluation of prognosis and prediction of treatment efficacy remains challenging due to the missing specific non-invasive biomarkers. The aim of this study was to identify disease-specific microRNA (miRNA) patterns for diagnosis, prediction of prognosis, and treatment response in patients with HCC. Methods: The study population included 42 HCC patients from SORAMIC clinical trial: 22 patients received sorafenib monotherapy, 20 patients underwent 90Y radioembolization in combination with sorafenib. 20 individuals were included in the control group. HCC patients underwent collection of plasma samples before and 7–9 weeks after the beginning of the treatment. Isolation of circulating miRNAs, preparation of small RNA sequencing libraries and next-generation sequencing were performed. Association analysis for novel diagnostic, prognostic, and treatment-related candidate biomarkers was performed. Results: A total of 42 differentially expressed (16 up-regulated and 26 down-regulated) miRNAs were identified comparing baseline and control group plasma samples. hsa-miR-215-5p and hsa-miR-192-5p were down-regulated, while hsa-miR-483-5p and hsa-miR-23b-3p were up-regulated comparing baseline and 7–9 weeks post-sorafenib monotherapy samples. hsa-miR-215-5p was the sole down-regulated miRNA in the same combination therapy comparison. hsa-miR-183-5p, hsa-miR-28-3p, and hsa-miR-1246 were found to be significantly up-regulated comparing non-responders versus responders to sorafenib. High hsa-miR-215-5p expression was significantly associated with worse HCC patients’ prognosis. Conclusions: Systematic miRNA profiling of highly characterized samples from SORAMIC study revealed a subset of potential miRNA biomarkers for HCC diagnosis and prognosis of sorafenib-treated patients’ survival.

Colorectal cancer (CRC) encompasses biologically diverse cellular phenotypes with distinct microRNA (miRNA) expression patterns. Assessing whether cell-model-derived alterations recur in extracellular vesicles (EVs) and human tumors may help prioritize candidates with broader relevance to CRC. We performed small RNA sequencing of non-malignant HCoEpiC cells, differentiated enterocyte-like Caco-2 cells, less differentiated HCT116 cells, and their corresponding EVs. miRNAs showing concordant dysregulation in both CRC cell lines relative to HCoEpiC, with greater absolute log₂ fold changes in HCT116, were prioritized and evaluated in human colorectal tissues and TCGA-COAD/READ. Seven of 29 prioritized cellular miRNAs met the EV selection criteria. Of the 26 candidates measurable in the patient-tissue dataset, eight showed FDR-significant, directionally concordant differences between CRC and healthy colorectal tissues, including five concordantly dysregulated across cells, EVs, and patient tissues. Analysis of 11 matched TCGA tumor–non-tumor pairs reproduced reduced miR-30a-3p, miR-30c-2-3p, and miR-1271-5p and increased miR-140-5p expression. Target-based enrichment and exploratory miRNA-mRNA correlation analyses identified associations with CRC-relevant signaling and MYC-related, cell-cycle, DNA-repair, and metabolic programs. No significant associations with the evaluated clinicopathological features or overall survival were detected. Collectively, these findings identify a reproducible subset of CRC-associated miRNA alterations and highlight reduced miR-30a-3p and miR-30c-2-3p expression as a recurrent family-level pattern warranting mechanistic investigation.