Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) is considered the most aggressive molecular subtype of breast cancer (BC), characterized by the tumours' negative status for estrogen (ER) and progesterone (PR) receptors and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2). The issue of this disease is two-fold; it is often diagnosed in its later stages, while, due to the absence of receptors, its treatment is limited to systemic chemotherapy, which has a high chance of inducing resistance in tumours. This further highlights the need for determination of novel targets for diagnosis and treatment of TNBC, with differentially expressed long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) showing high potential. To develop these novel approaches to treatment, systematic gathering and analysis of disease-specific data on lncRNAs is required. However, currently available databases are inconsistent, rarely updated with novel data, and have other limitations such as not being standardized. Therefore, the objective of this study was to design the first TNBC-specific database of differentially expressed lncRNAs (TNBClncRNAdb). The database TNBClncRNAdb includes 241 entries corresponding to 187 different lncRNAs. It was based on data collected from five existing databases, and updated with novel scientific literature. It includes information on lncRNAs, such as their approved symbols and aliases, their differential expression and molecular mechanism of regulation, and their direct and indirect downstream targets. The database OnCoLocDB was also designed, which serves as an expansion of TNBClncRNAdb and includes a list of genes, co-located with lncRNA genes (co-loc genes), their biotype, genome location, and possible role in cancer development. We concluded that lncRNAs show a high potential as biomarkers in diagnosis of TNBC, and as targets in its treatment. We also concluded that lncRNA genes overlap with co-loc genes with a role in cancer development, and regulate their expression. So-designed databases are informative and TNBC-specific and can, therefore, serve as a foundation for development of novel diagnostic and treatment procedures, targeting differentially expressed lncRNAs.
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