{"type": "root", "children": [{"type": "p", "children": [{"type": "t", "text": "\nDUXAP9 is a long non‐coding RNA that is significantly upregulated in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) tissues and cell lines, correlating with poorer overall survival. Its elevated expression contributes to the stemness of HCC cells, as evidenced by enhanced sphere‐formation ability, increased ALDH activity, and upregulation of other stemness markers. These cancer stem cell properties are critical for tumor progression, suggesting that DUXAP9 plays a key oncogenic role in HCC."}, {"type": "fg", "children": [{"type": "fg_f", "ref": "1"}]}, {"type": "t", "text": ""}]}, {"type": "t", "text": "\n\n"}, {"type": "p", "children": [{"type": "t", "text": "\nMechanistic investigations revealed that DUXAP9 exerts its pro-stemness function by directly binding to the 3′ untranslated region (UTR) of the sox9 mRNA, thereby enhancing its stability and subsequently increasing sox9 expression. Importantly, the stemness-promoting effects of DUXAP9 are dependent on sox9, establishing a novel DUXAP9/sox9 regulatory axis that may represent a promising target for therapeutic intervention in HCC."}, {"type": "fg", "children": [{"type": "fg_f", "ref": "1"}]}, {"type": "t", "text": ""}]}, {"type": "rg", "children": [{"type": "r", "ref": 1, "children": [{"type": "t", "text": "Ru Zeng, Chunyue Wang, Wenyi Wang, et al. "}, {"type": "b", "children": [{"type": "t", "text": "Long non-coding RNA DUXAP9 promotes hepatocellular carcinoma cell stemness via directly interacting with sox9."}]}, {"type": "t", "text": " "}, {"type": "i", "children": [{"type": "t", "text": "Environ Toxicol (2021)"}]}, {"type": "t", "text": " DOI: "}, {"type": "a", "children": [{"type": "t", "text": "10.1002/tox.23300"}], "href": "https://doi.org/10.1002/tox.23300"}, {"type": "t", "text": " PMID: "}, {"type": "a", "children": [{"type": "t", "text": "34086387"}], "href": "https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34086387"}]}]}]}