Abstract:  

Objective  To investigate the effect of RNA interference （siRNA） on ribosomal protein S6 kinase 2 （S6K2） expression on proliferation and apoptosis of cervical cancer cells and phosphatidylinositol 3 kinase （PI3K）／protein kinase B （Akt）／nuclear factor-κB （NF-κB） signaling pathway. Methods  The expression of S6K2 in human cervical cancer tissues was analyzed by Oncomine （tumor microarray database）. Human cervical cancer cell lines HeLa and Caski were transfected with siRNA targeting S6K2 （siRNA-S6K2） and control random sequence （siRNA-Ctrl）， respectively. Real-time fluorescence quantitative PCR （QPCR） was used to detect the mRNA levels of S6K2 in each group. CCK-8 method was used to detect the cell proliferation. Annexin V-FITC／PI doublestaining flow cytometry was used to detect the cell apoptotic rates. Western blotting was used to detect the levels of PI3K／Akt pathwayrelated proteins （p-Akt， Akt， p-mTOR and mTOR） 48 h after transfection. Immunofluorescence was used to evaluate the nuclear activity of NF-κB p65. Results  Oncomine bioinformatics analysis showed that the relative expression of S6K2 in cervical cancer tissues was significantly higher than that in normal cervical tissues in three cervical cancerrelated datasets （Biewenga, Scotto and Zhai）（P＜0.05）. The results of QPCR and Western blotting showed that the mRNA and protein levels of S6K2 after transfection of siRNA-S6K2 were significantly lower than those of the control group （P＜0.05）. The proliferative activity and levels of p-Akt and p-mTOR in HeLa and Caski cells transfected with siRNA-S6K2 decreased while the apoptotic rate increased， which was significantly different from that of cells transfected with siRNA-Ctrl （P＜0.05）. Immunofluorescence assay showed that the intranuclear fluorescence of cervical cancer cells transfected with siRNA-S6K2 decreased compared with the transfected siRNA-Ctrl cells, and the difference was statistically significant（P＜0.05）. Conclusion  S6K2 is highly expressed in cervical cancer tissues and participates in the proliferation and apoptosis of cervical cancer cells， so S6K2 has certain potential in the prevention and treatment of cervical cancer.

Key words: font-family:宋体, Cervical cancer">Cervical cancerfont-family:宋体, ')">">, Ribosomal protein S6 kinase 2, Proliferation, Apoptosis