Abstract
Recent studies have identified that ErbB3 binding protein 1 (EBP1) is broadly expressed in various cancer tissues and critically involved in plenty of biological processes in this regard. However, the functional role of EBP1 in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) has never been elucidated. In this study, we found that EBP1 could serve as a prognostic biomarker of PDAC. Western blot analysis revealed that EBP1 was remarkably upregulated in PDAC tissues and cell lines. Using immunohistochemical analysis, we showed that the expression of EBP1 was correlated with tumor size (P = 0.004), histological differentiation (P = 0.041), and tumor node metastasis (TNM) stage (P = 0.000). Notably, Kaplan–Meier curve showed that high expression of EBP1 predicted significantly worsened prognosis of PDAC patients (P = 0.001). In addition, knockdown of EBP1 expression suppressed PDAC cell proliferation and retarded cell cycle progression. Furthermore, depletion of EBP1 induced the apoptosis of Panc-1 cells. Of great interest, we found that EBP1 interacted with anti-apoptotic protein, Bcl-xL, and promoted its accumulation. In summary, our results suggest that EBP1 is a novel prognostic indicator and potential therapeutic target of PDAC, shedding new insights into the important role of EBP1 in cancer development.
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Acknowledgments
This work was supported by the National Natural Scientific Foundation of China (No. 81072028) and Jiangsu Province’s Outstanding Medical Academic Leader program (No. LJ101135).
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Chen Gong and Yixin Zhang contributed equally to this work.
The Publisher and Editor retract this article in accordance with the recommendations of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). After a thorough investigation we have strong reason to believe that the peer review process was compromised.
Date: 16th June 2017
As an update to the retraction note, further investigation has revealed that the compromised peer review process was through no fault of the authors.
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Supplemental Fig. 1
Graphic representation of the relationship between EBP1 and Ki-67 expression in 191 PDAC specimens. The scatter plots of EBP1 versus Ki-67 with regression line showing a correlation of them using the Spearman’s correlation coefficient. (GIF 15 kb)
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Gong, C., Zhang, Y., Chen, Y. et al. RETRACTED ARTICLE: High expression of ErbB3 binding protein 1 (EBP1) predicts poor prognosis of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC). Tumor Biol. 36, 9189–9199 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13277-015-3625-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13277-015-3625-6