Figure 1.

Arpin mRNA under-expression is associated with poor prognosis in breast cancer. (A) Expression of the three Arp2/3 inhibitors, Arpin, PICK1 and Gadkin was examined in a large series of breast tumours from patients and in 10 normal breast tissues. mRNA values were quantified using qRT–PCR. Values of breast cancer samples were normalised to the median of the 10 normal breast tissue values. *Information available for 454 tumours, **information available for 446 tumours. PICK1 expression did not significantly vary among the breast tumours. In contrast, expression of Arpin (C15ORF38) and Gadkin (AP1AR) genes varies in a significant number of tumours, Arpin being under-expressed and Gadkin overexpressed. (B) Metastasis-free survival (MFS) of patients was determined as the interval between initial diagnosis and detection of the first metastasis. Survival distributions in the different groups of gene expression were plotted using the Kaplan–Meier method, and the significance of the difference was ascertained with the log-rank test using optimal cutoffs (0.31 for Arpin and 0.83 for Gadkin). Whereas Gadkin expression does not significantly affect MFS (P=0.14), patients harbouring tumours with reduced Arpin mRNA expression have a significant poorer prognosis compared with the others (P=0.022).