Extrachromosomal circular DNA (eccDNA) has recently gained increasing attention due to its significant role in cancer and other pathophysiologic states. The majority of circular DNAs detected by Circle-seq are small-size eccDNAs with enigmatic functions. One major technical hurdle is to synthesize eccDNA for functional identification. Here, we describe CAES (Circle-seq based Artificial EccDNA Synthesis), a promising and reliable method for artificial eccDNA synthesis. Eight eccDNAs carrying different microRNA genes (eccMIR) found in gastric cancer tissues, ranging from 329 bp to 2189 bp in size, were created utilizing the CAES method. Exonuclease V and single restriction-endonuclease digestion identified the circular structure of synthetic eccDNAs. The DNA circularization efficiency afforded by CAES ranged from 15.6% to 31.1%, which was negatively correlated with the eccDNA length. In addition, we demonstrated that CAES-synthesized eccMIRs can express both miRNA-3p and − 5p molecules efficiently independent of a canonical promoter in human cell lines. Further assays proved that these eccMIRs were functional as they were able to repress the luciferase gene containing a miRNA-target sequence in the 3′UTR as well as the endogenous mRNA targets. Finally, kinetics study revealed that eccDNA exhibited a decay rate similar to the standard plasmids and linear DNA in cultured cells. Together, this study offers a rapid and convenient method for Circle-seq users to synthesize artificial eccDNAs. It also demonstrates the promising potential of eccMIR as a bacterial DNA-free vector for safe and robust miRNA overexpression in both basic research and therapeutic applications.
Funding Information:
This work was supported by the Research Start-up Fund of The Seventh Affiliated Hospital, Sun Yat-sen University (Grant No. 592026 ), the Shenzhen Science and Technology Innovation Commission (Grant No. JCYJ20220530145014033 and JCYJ20230807110401003 ), Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Digestive Cancer Research (Grant No. 2021B1212040006 ), the Open Fund of Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Digestive Cancer Research (Grant No. GPKLDCR202206M ) and Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities,Sun Yat-sen University (Grant No. 2023KYPT02 ).
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