Animal xenografts

Nude mice were purchased from Shanghai SLAC Laboratory Animal Co.,Ltd. (Shanghai, China) and housed at the animal experiment center of Zhengzhou University, where the implantation experiment was performed. All the protocols were previously approved by the Zhengzhou University Animal Ethics Committee. HepG2 cells (1 × 10⁶) were suspended in 200 μl medium, and injected subcutaneously into the flank regions of 48 female athymic nude mice. Two weeks after inoculation, visible subcutaneous tumors were detected, and the tumors were measured approximately 2.5 mm in diameter 3 weeks after inoculation. All animals were randomly divided into 3 groups (8 mice per group): the Model group, the NC group, and the lncRNA-{"type":"entrez-nucleotide","attrs":{"text":"CR594715","term_id":"50475522","term_text":"CR594715"}}CR594715-silencing group. For the intervention groups, each animal received 30 μl recombinant lentivirus (1 × 10⁸ IFU) twice a week since the second week for 4 weeks, while the model group received the same volume of saline instead. Tumor diameter was measured weekly since the second week, and the data was used to plot the tumor growth curves. The formula for calculating the tumor volume was: V = 1/2 a × b2, a and b are the long and short diameters of the tumor, respectively.