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. 2014 Nov 27;6(12):10116–10133. doi: 10.18632/oncotarget.2687

Figure 1. Downregulation of Cx32 in HCC tissues is associated with a poor prognosis for HCC patients.

Figure 1

(A) Western blot analysis of Cx32 protein expression in 24 human HCC samples and their adjacent non-tumorous liver tissue samples. N: non-tumorous liver tissue, T: tumor tissue. (B) Quantitative analysis of Cx32 protein expression in 24 human HCC samples and mRNA level analysis of Cx32 in another set of 49 HCC tumor samples (T) vs. non-tumor samples (NT); *p < 0.05. (C) Summary of the differences in the expression of Cx32 protein and mRNA between paired tumor and non-tumor liver tissues. (D) Immunohistochemical staining for Cx32 in HCC tumor tissue (T) and non-tumorous liver tissue (NT). (E) Tumor size was inversely correlated with Cx32 mRNA expression in HCC tissues. The median expression value of all 40 cases was chosen as the cutoff value for separating the dataset into a Cx32–low expression group and a Cx32–high expression group. (F) Metastatic HCC displayed lower Cx32 expression levels. The absence (n = 17) and presence (n = 23) of vascular invasion (tumor thrombus in the veins of adjacent non-tumor tissues or in the portal vein) is indicated with a minus sign (–) and plus sign (+), respectively; *p < 0.05. (G) Kaplan-Meier curves revealed an association of lower Cx32 levels with a shorter overall postoperative survival.