INF2, an oncogenic protein in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC)

Abstract Objectives This study investigated the expression level of INF2 and its carcinogenic effects in hepatocellular carcinoma. In addition, the mechanism of INF2 in hepatocellular carcinoma was explored. Materials and methods We analyzed the expression of INF2 and its prognosis and even correlation with clinicopathological characteristics based on the public database and HCC samples. Cloning formation experiment and flow cytometry were used to analyze the effect of INF2 expression level on the growth of HCC cells. Cell scratch experiment and Transwell migration experiment were applied to determine the role of INF2 expression level in the migration ability of HCC cells. TIMER2.0 database and TCGA-LIHC database were used to analyze the correlation between INF2 and PD-L1 in HCC. Results INF2 is aberrantly high expression in HCC samples. And high INF2 expression is associated with overall survival, liver cirrhosis and pathological differentiation. In vitro HCC cell models, upregulated expression of INF2 triggers the proliferation and migration of the HCC cell, while knockout of INF2 could counteract this effect. Knockdown of INF2 inhibited the proliferation and migration of HCC in vitro may via suppressing the Drp1-mediated mitochondrial fission. Moreover, INF2 was positively correlated with PD-L1 in HCC. Conclusions INF2 is an oncogenic protein in hepatocellular carcinoma, and targeting to INF2 may be beneficial to HCC patients with high expression of INF2.