Overexpression of Pofut1 and activated Notch1 may be associated with poor prognosis in breast cancer

Purpose: The present study was to evaluate the prognostic value of protein expression of Pofutl and Notchl signaling in breast cancer. Material and methods: Formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded 314 breast specimens including 174 infiltrating ductal carcinoma(IDC), 50 ductal carcinoma in situ(DCIS) and 90 adjacent normal tissue(ANT) were immunohistochemically examined to evaluate the protein expression of Pofutl, activated Notchl(N1IC) and Slug on specimens. Survival analysis was performed by Kaplan-Meier method and Cox's proportional-hazards model. A online database was computationally used to further explore the prognostic role of Pofuti and Notchl mRNA expression by Kaplan-Meier Plotter. Results: Pofuti, Slug and NIIC expression were significantly increased in IDC compared to ANT(all p < 0.05). High expression of Pofutl, Slug and NI IC were associated with tumor aggressiveness including lymph node metastasis (LNM: p = 0.005 for Pofutl, p < 0.001 for NIIC, p = 0.017 for Slug), advanced stage(p = 0.039 for Pofutl, p = 0.025 for N1IC) and higher histological grade(p = 0.001 for NIIC). Additionally, high expression of Pofutl was found to be significantly associated with high expressions of NIIC and Slug in IDC(r = 0.244, p = 0.001; r = 0.374, p < 0.001, respectively), similar correlation was also observed between high NlIC and Slug expression(r = 0.496, p < 0.001). Moreover, Kaplan-Meier and Cox's regression analysis indicated the significant prognostic value of elevated Pofutl, N1IC, Slug expressions, positive LNM and advanced tumor stage for the prediction of a shorter disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival(OS). The web-based analysis also suggested a significant association of high Pofutl and Notch1.mRNA expression with worse survival outcome. Conclusion: Our findings suggested that overexpression of Pofutl and activated Notchl signaling may be associated with a poor prognosis in breast cancer. (C) 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.