Objective   To investigate the expression level of silencing information regulatory 2 (SIRT2) in cervical cancer and CIN tissues and its clinical significance.

  Methods   Immunohistochemistry was carried out to examine the expression of SIRT2 in 262 cases of cervical cancer tissues, 75 cases of precancerous lesions and 75 cases of normal cervical tissues, and the clinical implications of SIRT2 was further analyzed. The protein expression level of SIRT2 in 40 cervical cancer fresh tissue samples and 20 normal cervical tissue samples was detected by Western blot. shRNA-SIRT2 virus was transfected into HeLa cells to obtain the SIRT2-down-regulated HeLa cells. And the influence of down-regulation of SIRT2 on cell proliferation and migration was investigated by MTT and Scratch test.

  Results   Immunohistochemical results showed that SIRT2 protein expression level gradually increased in cervical cancer, CIN and normal cervix tissues (P < 0.001). Western blot confirmed that SIRT2 expression level was higher in cervical cancer tissues than in normal cervix tissues (P < 0.001). The expression level of SIRT2 in cervical cancer was correlated with some factors, such as lymph node metastasis, histological type, clinical staging and HPV infection (P < 0.05). At the same time, it was independent of some factors including age, differentiation degree, pelvic metastasis, whether involving the cervical interstitial and the involvement depth and whether involving the neck junction and vaginal ends (P>0.05). Mortality in SIRT2 high expression patient group was higher than that of SIRT2 low expression patient group (P < 0.05). shRNA interference technique could effectively inhibit the expression level of SIRT2 in HeLa cells (P < 0.05). MTT assay and Scratch test indicated that down-regulation of SIRT2 expression inhibited the proliferation and migration of HeLa cells (P < 0.05).

  Conclusion   SIRT2 may play a promoting role in the progress of cervical cancer, and SIRT2 may be related to the development of malignant degree of cervical cancer, and the inhibition of SIRT2 expression may be a potential therapeutic target for cervical cancer.