Stomatin-like protein 2 promotes cell proliferation and survival under 5-Fluorouracil stress in hepatocellular carcinoma

Background The crucial role of STOML2 in tumor progression has been documented recently in various cancers. Previous studies have shown that STOML2 promoted cancer cell proliferation, but the underlying mechanism is not fully illustrated. Methods and results The expression and clinical relevance of STOML2 in pan-cancer was analyzed by TIMER2 web platform in pan-cancer. The prognostic significance of STOML2 in HCC was evaluated utilizing KM curve and a nomogram model. Signaling pathways associated with STOML2 expression were discovered by GSEA. CCK-8 assay was performed to evaluate the proliferative capacity of HCC cells after manipulating STOML2 expression. Flow cytometry was utilized to analyze cell cycle progression. Results indicated that increased STOML2 expression in HCC linked to unfavorable clinical outcomes. Cell cycle and cell division related terms were enriched under conditions of elevated STOML2 expression via GSEA analysis. A notable decrease in cell proliferation was observed in MHCC97H with STOML2 knocked-down, accompanied by G1-phase arrest, up-regulation of p21, down-regulation of CyclinD1 and its regulatory factor MYC, while STOML2 overexpression in Huh7 showed the opposite results. These results indicated that STOML2 was responsible for HCC proliferation by regulating the expression level of MYC/cyclin D1 and p21. Furthermore, an inverse correlation was found between STOML2 expression and 5-FU sensitivity. Conclusions STOML2 promotes cell cycle progression in HCC which is associated with activation of MYC/CyclinD1/p21 pathway, and modulates the response of HCC to 5-FU.