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Elevated STMN1 Expression Correlates with Poor Prognosis in Patients with Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma

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Pathology & Oncology Research

Abstract

STMN1 is a cytosolic phosphoprotein that not only participates in cell division, but also plays an important role in other microtubule-dependent processes, such as cell motility. Furthermore, STMN1 acts as a “relay protein” in several intracellular signaling pathways that influence cell growth and differentiation. Thus, STMN1 is likely to support cellular processes essential for tumor progression: survival and migration. Indeed, elevated STMN1 expression has been reported in various types of human malignancies and is correlated with poor prognosis in these human malignancies. However, the clinical and prognostic significance of STMN1 in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) remains unknown. Thus, we assessed STMN1 in PDAC in this retrospective study. We first examined STMN1 expression in PDAC tissues from 27 cases and matched adjacent non-cancerous tissues by quantitative polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and western blot analyses. Next, immunohistochemistry was used to evaluate STMN1 expression in 87 archived paraffin-embedded PDAC specimens. STMN1 mRNA and protein expression levels were to a large extent up-regulated in PDAC tissue compared with their adjacent non-cancerous tissues. Moreover, STMN1 expression was closely correlated with histological differentiation, lymphatic metastasis, and TNM stage (P = 0.023, 0.047, and 0.014, respectively). In addition, PDAC patients with higher STMN1 expression died sooner than those with lower STMN1 expression (P < 0.01). Multivariate analysis demonstrated that STMN1 expression was an independent prognostic factor for PDAC patients (P < 0.01). Herein, we provide the first evidence that up-regulated STMN1 may contribute to tumor progression and poor prognosis in PDAC patients and may serve as a novel prognostic marker.

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Acknowledgments

This study was supported by the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities of Central South Universityand and grant 81372464 from the National Natural Science Foundation of China.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of PET center, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, China

    Jian Li

  2. Department of General Surgery, The fourth Hospital of Changsha, Changsha, China

    Guohuang Hu

  3. Department of Anesthesiology, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, China

    Fujiao Kong

  4. Department of General Surgery, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, China

    Kemin Wu, Kun Song, Jianfeng He & Weijia Sun

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  1. Jian Li
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  2. Guohuang Hu
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  7. Weijia Sun
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Correspondence to Weijia Sun.

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Li, J., Hu, G., Kong, F. et al. Elevated STMN1 Expression Correlates with Poor Prognosis in Patients with Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma. Pathol. Oncol. Res. 21, 1013–1020 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12253-015-9930-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12253-015-9930-y

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