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Researchers have identified a non-protein-coding RNA whose expression is linked to ovarian cancer, according to a new study. 

Researchers built a DNA copy number profile for nearly 14,000 long non-coding RNA, also known as IncRNAs, across 12 cancer types, including ovarian and breast cancers. They noted that the number of copies of IncRNA genes on chromosome consistently change in 12 different cancer types and IncRNA genes are widely expressed in cancer cells. 

Researchers are still to explain the functionality of these non-protein RNAs, but given their vast numbers in the human genome, researchers believe that they likely play important roles in normal human development and response to disease, the press release added.

"This is the first genome-wide study to use bioinformatics and clinical information to systematically identify one lncRNA, which we found to be oncogenic," said lead researcher  Lin Zhang, PhD, research associate professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, in the press release. 

These data, Zhang explained, suggest a molecular mechanism in which amplification of the FAL1 gene in ovarian cancer causes a surfeit of FAL1 RNA.

The study is published online in Cancer Cell.