Abstract:  Objective  To investigate the expression of miR-322 and galectin-3 （Gal-3） in thyroid papillary carcinoma （PTC） and its clinical significance. Methods  From January 2017 to January 2018， the tissue samples of 96 patients who underwent surgical resection were collected, including 49 cases of PTC， 29 cases of follicular adenoma （FA）， 25 cases of nodular goiter （NG） and 29 cases of normal tissue adjacent to FA. Real-time fluorescence quantitative PCR （QPCR） was used to detect the expression of Gal-3 mRNA and miR-322 in various tissues， and the relationship between the expression and the clinicopathological characteristics of PTC was analyzed. Dual luciferase reporter assay was used to verify the target relationship between miR322 and Gal-3. The relationship between miR322 and Gal-3 was analyzed by Pearson correlation analysis. Receiver operating characteristic （ROC） curve was used to determine the diagnostic value of Gal-3 and miR-322. Results  The expressions of Gal-3 mRNA in PTC， FA， NG and NC tissues were 1.76±0.42， 0.85±0.37， 0.89±0.39 and 0.25±0.14， respectively. The expressions of miR-322 in PTC， FA， NG and NC tissues were 1.10±0.21， 0.50±0.17， 0.49±0.19 and 0.12±0.04， respectively. The expression of Gal-3 and miR-322 in PTC tissues was higher than that of the other 3 groups （P＜0.05）. Gal-3 mRNA expression was associated with tumor diameter， invasion， lymph node metastasis， TNM stage， BRAFV600E and BRAFT1799A gene mutation （P＜0.05）. MiR-322 expression was associated with tumor diameter， TNM stage， BRAFV600E and BRAFT1799A gene mutation （P＜0.05）. MiR-322 inhibited the luciferase activity of wild-type Gal-3 3’UTR reporter vector， but had no effect on the luciferase activity of mutant Gal3 3’UTR. The area under the curve（AUC） of ROC curve of miR-322 and Gal-3 on the occurrence of PTC were 0.773 （95％CI： 0.572-0.889） and 0.711 （95％CI：0.614-0.900） respectively （P＞0.05）. And the AUC of ROC curve of miR-322 combined with Gal-3 was 0.915 （95％CI： 0.802-0.997）. Conclusion  MiR-322 and Gal-3 are highly expressed in PTC， and the relationship between Mi-322 and Gal-3 may be an important auxiliary diagnostic molecule for PTC and a potential target for drug therapy.

Key words: font-family:宋体, Papillary thyroid carcinoma">Papillary thyroid carcinomafont-family:宋体, ')">">, Galectin-3, miRNAs, Diagnosis