Transwell experiments were employed to detect the invasion and migration of STIP1-depleted and control U87 and U251 cells and western blotting was used to detect the expression of TRAP1/Akt pathway proteins.
Overexpression of TRAP-1 was significantly associated with differentiation (P=0.011), depth of invasion (P=0.006), lymph node metastasis (P<0.001) and tumor-node-metastasis stage (P<0.001).
Consequently, our data demonstrated that TRAP1 expression was a good prognostic biomarker for depth of invasion and disease-specific survival in colorectal cancer.
Mechanistically, reconstitution of Pten<sup>+/-</sup> prostatic epithelial cells with TRAP1 increases cell proliferation, reduces apoptosis, and promotes cell invasion without changes in mitochondrial bioenergetics.
Overexpression of TRAP1 in MDA-MB-231 cells causes mitochondrial fusion, triggers mitochondria to form tubular networks, and suppresses cell migration and invasion in vitro and in vivo.