low expression of microrna1266 promotes colorectal cancer progression via targeting fto objective to explore the role of microrna1266 in colorectal cancer crc and its underlying mechanismpatients and methods the expression level of microrna1266 in 48 crc tissues and paracancerous tissues was detected by quantitative realtimepolymerase chain reaction qrtpcr the relationship between microrna1266 expression and basic characteristics of crc patients was analyzed the effect of microrna1266 on the viability of crc cells was detected by cell counting kit8 cck8 assay subsequently a potential target gene for microrna1266 was predicted through bioinformatics finally the binding condition between microrna1266 and the target gene was verified by rna binding protein immunoprecipitation rip and luciferase reporter gene assay respectivelyresults microrna1266 was lowly expressed in 48 cases of crc tissues than that of paracancerous tissues clinical data demonstrated that microrna1266 expression was correlated to tumor size and tnm of crc patients knockdown of microrna1266 promoted proliferation of crc cells fto was predicted to be the target gene for microrna1266 which was negatively regulated by microrna1266conclusions microrna1266 is lowly expressed in crc tissues than that of paracancerous tissues lowly expressed microrna1266 promotes the occurrence and progression of crc by directly targeting fto