Fig. 1.

LYZ is a prognosticator of both the overall survival and relapse-free survival for HCC patients. (A) Workflow for selecting potential prognostic and druggable proteins for S-III HCCs with dots showing the 12 candidate proteins. Red denotes secretory proteins; blue denotes nonsecretory proteins. HR, hazard ratio (an HR of greater than 1 indicates that the observed variable increases the risk of death); OS, overall survival; RFS, relapse-free survival. (B) Boxplot shows differential LYZ expression in HCC tumor tissues (T) and paired paracancerous tissues (P) of different subtypes of HCC detected by MS. Each dot represents an individual sample analyzed by MS. (C and D) Kaplan–Meier analysis of the OS and RFS probability for HCC patients with different LYZ expression intensities under the optimal cut-off value. The frequency of patients with S-I/II/III HCC in the LYZ-low group was 35, 30, and 14, respectively, and that of patients with S-I/II/III HCC in the LYZ-high group was 1, 2, and 19, respectively. (E) IHC staining of LYZ and CK8/CK18 expression in HCC and paired nontumor liver tissues. Representative graphs indicate positive staining of LYZ in HCC cells (Below) but not in normal hepatocytes (Above). (F) Kaplan–Meier analysis of the OS for HCC patients in relation to LYZ staining scores detected in (E). Patients with positive staining of LYZ in HCC cells (N = 24) or in over 30% stromal cells (N = 11) were classified into LYZ high group; the others (N = 143) were classified into the LYZ low group. (G) Upper HE staining indicates distinct differentiation degrees within a single HCC tissue. IHC analyses of LYZ, Ki-67, and CK8/18 expressions in the same HCC tissue are shown below. The results shown here are representative of three HCC patients. Data in B show upper quartile, median, and lower quartile. (Scale bars in E and G represent 50 μm.) **P < 0.01, ***P < 0.001 (two-tailed paired Wilcoxon test for B; Log-rank test for C, D, and F).