The role of splicing factor PRPF8 in breast cancer.

<bold>Background: </bold>Alternative splicing is a mechanism to produce different proteins with diverse functions from one gene. Many splicing factors play an important role in cancer progression. PRPF8 is a core protein component of the spliceosome complex, U4/U6-U5 tri-snRNP.<bold>Objective: </bold>However, PRPF8 involved in mRNA alternative splicing are rarely included in the prognosis.<bold>Methods: </bold>We found that PRPF8 was expressed in all examined cancer types. Further analyses found that PRPF8 expression was significantly different between the breast cancer and paracancerous tissues.<bold>Results: </bold>Survival analyses showed that PRPF8-high patients had a poor prognosis, and the expression of PRPF8 is associated with distant metastasis-free survival (DMFS) and post progression survival (PPS). Gene Set Enrichment Analysis (GSEA) has revealed that PRPF8 expression is correlated with TGF-β, JAK-STAT, and cell cycle control pathways. Consistent with these results, upon PRPF8 silencing, the growth of MCF-7 cells was reduced, the ability of cell clone formation was weakened, and p⁢21 expression was increased.<bold>Conclusions: </bold>These results have revealed that PRPF8 is a significant factor for splicing in breast cancer progression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]