Knockdown of Nucleostemin in an ovarian cancer SKOV-3Â cell line and its effects on cell malignancy

•The knockdown of Nucleostemin led to cell-cycle arrest.•Nucleostemin depletion inhibited metastasis and tumor formation.•Nucleostemin contributes to malignant progression in ovarian cancer.

Nucleostemin plays an essential role in the proliferation of some stem cells and cancer cells, but no research has been conducted to assess the link between Nucleostemin and ovarian cancer. To investigate the role of Nucleostemin in ovarian cancer tumorigenesis, we generated short hairpin (sh)RNA to knockdown the expression of the Nucleostemin gene in an ovarian cancer SKOV-3 cell line. We found that knockdown of this gene led to cell-cycle arrest, as well as to an increase in apoptosis. In addition, migration and invasion demonstrated significant inhibition in Nucleostemin-deficient cells. Furthermore, the knockdown of Nucleostemin dramatically suppressed xenograft progression in BALB/c nude mice. Our findings suggest that Nucleostemin is associated with malignancy in an ovarian cancer SKOV-3 cell line.

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