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Updated: Jan 21, 2026

Orthotopic Mouse Model of Colorectal Cancer
Published on: December 4, 2007
KRT18 is correlated with the malignant status and acts as an oncogene in colorectal cancer
Jingfeng Zhang1, Sifeng Hu2, Yansen Li3
1Department of Anorectal Surgery, The Affiliated Hospital of Jining Medical University, Jining 272029, Shandong, China.
Abstract:
Keratin 18 (KRT18) has been suggested to be overexpressed in most types of human tumor, but the expression pattern of KRT18 in colorectal cancer (CRC) remained unknown. In our research, KRT18 protein expression was markedly increased in CRC cancer tissues and cell lines compared with adjacent normal colorectal tissues and normal colonic epithelial cell line, respectively. Meanwhile, we observed high KRT18 expression was associated with advanced clinical stage, deep tumor invasion, lymph node metastasis, distant metastasis, poor differentiation and unfavorable prognosis in CRC patients. Multivariate Cox regression analysis showed high expression of KRT18 was an unfavorable independent predictor for overall survival in CRC patients. The in vitro studies indicated down-regulation of KRT18 expression depressed CRC cell viability, migration and invasion. In conclusion, KRT18 serves as an oncogenic role in CRC progression and may be a therapeutic target for promoting CRC patients' prognosis.
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