Cell-cycle-associated and expression-elevated protein in tumor (CREPT) functions as a cell cycle modulator that enhances the transcription of cyclin D1 by interacting with RNA polymerase II. CREPT has been identified to be overexpressed in various human cancer types; however, the expression and significance of CREPT in renal cell carcinoma (RCC) has remained largely elusive. In the present study, increased expression of CREPT was identified in 46.7% RCC tissues compared with adjacent normal tissue (31.1%; P=0.032) using immunohistochemistry. Furthermore, overexpression of CREPT was significantly associated with the Tumor-Node-Metastasis stage (χ2=11.967, P=0.001) and Fuhrman grade (χ2=15.453, P<0.001). In addition, increased expression of CREPT was associated with poor overall survival (P=0.021) and disease-free survival (P=0.015) of patients according to Kaplan-Meier analysis. Cellular function assays demonstrated that knockdown of CREPT in the 786-O and 769P RCC cell lines suppressed their proliferative, colony formation, migratory and invasive capacity and led to cell cycle arrest in the G1 phase. In addition, the western blotting analysis demonstrated that CREPT may control the cell cycle through downregulation of cyclin D1 and c-myc. Collectively, the overexpression of CREPT was indicated to be a negative prognostic factor for RCC, and CREPT may serve as a novel therapeutic target for the treatment of RCC.
Oncology letters. 2019 Sep 09 [Epub]
Huaqi Yin, Qingfei Cao, Haiyue Zhao, Shenheng Wang, Weinan Chen, Xiaowei Zhang, Zhijie Chang, Tao Xu, Xiongjun Ye
Department of Urology, Peking University People's Hospital, The Second Clinical Medical College of Peking University, Beijing 100044, P.R. China., Department of Urology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Jinzhou Medical University, Jinzhou, Liaoning 121001, P.R. China., State Key Laboratory of Membrane Biology, School of Medicine, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, P.R. China.