Fig. 7

Silencing BNIP3 significantly alleviated FTO-dependent tumor growth and metastasis in vitro and in vivo. a, b Knockdown of BNIP3 effectively increased cell number and cell growth of FTO-knockdown MDA-MB-231 cells (a) and MCF-7 cells (b). Cell numbers were counted by FACS (left panel); Cell growth was determined by CCK8 assay (right panel). Mean ± SD. **P ≤ 0.01, ***P ≤ 0.001, ****P ≤ 0.0001. c-d Knockdown of BNIP3 effectively induced cell proliferation in FTO-knockdown MDA-MB-231 cells (c) and MCF-7 cells (d) by Edu cell proliferation assay. Quantification of signal was shown in between as indicated. *P ≤ 0.05, **P ≤ 0.01. e Knockdown of BNIP3 effectively promoted FTO-knockdown 4 T1 cell growth in mice. FTO-knockdown and double knockdown 4 T1 cells were subcutaneously implanted in nude mice. f, g The size (f) and the weight (g) of tumor formed in the subcutaneous implantation mice model was monitored every 3 days. ****P ≤ 0.0001. h-j Knockdown of BNIP3 promoted lung metastasis in FTO-knockdown mouse model. FTO-knockdown and double knockdown 4 T1 cells were tail vain injected into BALB/c mice. Formation of breast cancer metastatic foci in the lung was pictured (h) and quantified (i) after 2 weeks. The metastases were confirmed by hematoxylin and eosin staining (j). **P ≤ 0.01