Androgen‐responsive tripartite motif 36 enhances tumor‐suppressive effect by regulating apoptosis‐related pathway in prostate cancer

Tripartite motif 36 (TRIM36) belongs to the TRIM family, most members of which areinvolved in ubiquitination and degradation of target proteins by functioning as E3ubiquitin ligases. The function of TRIM36 has not been well documented, therefore,we investigated the clinical significance and function of TRIM36 in human prostatecancer (PC). Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that TRIM36 immunoreactivitywas an independent predictor of cancer-specificsurvival of PC patients.Gain-of-functionstudy revealed that overexpression of TRIM36 suppressed cell proliferationand migration of LNCaP, 22Rv1, and DU145 cells. Moreover, TRIM36knockdown using siRNA suppressed apoptosis and promoted cell proliferation andmigration in LNCaP and 22Rv1 cells. Furthermore, our microarray analysis revealedthat the apoptosis-relatedpathway was significantly upregulated by TRIM36 overexpression.The TUNEL assay showed that apoptosis promoted by docetaxel treatmentwas alleviated in siTRIM36-treatedLNCaP and 22Rv1 cells. Taken together, theseresults suggest that high expression of TRIM36 is associated with favorable prognosisand that TRIM36 plays a tumor-suppressiverole by inhibiting cell proliferation andmigration as well as promoting apoptosis in PC.