HOXA5 and colonic neoplasm: As shown in Fig. 5b, advanced colon cancer tissues (stage III or IV) expressed significantly higher levels of HOXA5 short RNA compared to that in the paired normal tissues (P = 0.022), whereas the expression of the coding HOXA5 mRNA was downregulated during early stages (P = 0.024) and remained unchanged in colon cancer tissues from advanced stages (Fig. 5c).