Fig. 3

Upregulation of METTL14 enhances the growth and metastasis of pancreatic cancer. a Viability of PANC-1 cells expressing shCtrl, shMETTL14, vector or exogenous METTL14 detected by the CCK8 assay. ***p < 0.001. b Representative images from the colony-forming assay (lower panel) and colony number analysis (upper panel). All experiments were performed in triplicate and data are presented as the mean ± SD. **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001. c Images (left panel; scale bar: 1 cm) and weight analysis (right panel) of subcutaneous tumors from the indicated groups. * p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01. d Images of the orthotopic transplantation mouse model (shCtrl, shMETTL14, vector or METTL14 groups; lower panel), and analysis of the orthotopic tumor diameter (upper panel). * p < 0.05. PANC-1 cells expressing shCtrl, shMETTL14, vector or METTL14 were subjected to a transwell assay with or without Matrigel (Scale bar: 200 μm) (e), and to a wound-healing assay (Scale bar: 200 μm) (f). All experiments were performed in triplicate and data are presented as the mean ± SD. ** p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001. g Images of armpit lymph node metastasis in the subcutaneous implantation model (left panel) and the respective quantitative analysis (right panel). * p < 0.05. h Statistical analysis of the average number of liver metastases per group in the orthotopic transplantation mouse model. Scale bar: 1 mm. * p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01. i Statistical analysis of the average number of liver metastases per group in the liver metastasis model. ** p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001