promotes melanoma progression through rewiring cell glucose metabolism.

BACKGROUND

To investigate the role of in the development of skin cutaneous melanoma (SKCM) and possible mechanisms.

METHODS

We examined the expression of in SKCM in The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and Oncomine database and analyzed the relationship between expression and melanoma prognosis. Furthermore, we silenced the gene by RNA interference in A375 cells and investigated the effect of silencing on the biological function of melanoma cells.

RESULTS

The expression of in SKCM was upregulated in the tumor tissues compared with the paired normal tissues. Survival analysis showed that higher expression in SKCM patients was associated with poor clinical outcome compared with the lower expression group. Silencing of in A375 cells significantly inhibited the melanoma cell growth and proliferation ability, and also significantly decreased the total glucose consumption and lactate production. Gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA) showed that MYC targets gene set pathway was highly enriched in the high expression group. The expression levels of some MYC targets-related oncogenes, including , and , were reduced in the A375 cells with knockdown and upregulated in SKCM tissues with high expression, and there was a positive correlation between them.

CONCLUSIONS

An important role is played by in promoting melanoma cell growth and glucose metabolism, possibly through activation of the target pathway.