Figure 4. Effects of lincRNA P7 down-regulation on tumor growth in a nude mouse model.

(A, B) SMMC7721 cells (5 × 10⁶) that stably expressed lincRNA P7 were inoculated into nude mice, and the effect of lincRNA P7 on HCC tumor growth was examined every 3 days for 42 days (6 weeks) (n = 6). The results show that lincRNA P7 significantly increased the proliferation of HCC tumor cells compared with the control lentiviral vector in nude mice. ^***P < 0.001 (C) Tumor weight in each of the two groups is shown. The results are presented as the means ± s.d. for six mice in each group. ^*P < 0.05, compared with control cells by two-sided t-test. (D) Effect of lincRNA P7 on HCC growth was described by tumor/body weight ratio in the two groups. Data are shown as the mean ± s.d. ^**P < 0.01. (E) The expression levels of lincRNA P7 were determined by qRT-PCR in the xenograft tumors. (F) The expression levels of the phospho-Erk1/2 and phospho-STAT1 were determined by Western Blotting in the xenograft tumors.