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Background: Transcription factors are commonly deregulated in various cancers. Here, we evaluated role of ELF3 in pathogenesis of bladder carcinoma (BCa)., Materials and Methods: We confirmed ELF3 expression pattern in BCa cell lines using western blot; and in different grades of tumors using Immunohistochemistry. Cell invasion assay was employed to demonstrate potential role of ELF3 in EMT., Results and Conclusion: ELF3 showed selective expression in low-grade cell lines and tumor tissues. Overexpression of ELF3 in mesenchymal cell line UMUC3 resulted in reduced invasion and decreased expression of mesenchymal markers. We observed association of low ELF3 expression with increased risk and overall poor survival using publicly available data. ELF3-modulated reversal of EMT might be a useful strategy in the treatment of bladder cancer.

Raf Kinase inhibitory protein (RKIP) is a well-established metastasis suppressor that is frequently downregulated in aggressive cancers. The impact of RKIP and its phosphorylated form on disease-free survival (DFS) and other clinicopathological parameters in breast cancer is yet to be discovered. To this end, we examined RKIP expression in 3 independent breast cancer cohorts. At the Protein level, loss or reduced total RKIP expression was associated with large-sized tumors characterized by high proliferative index, high-grade and diminished estrogen (ER) and progesterone receptor expression. Loss or diminution of RKIP expression was significantly associated with shorter DFS in all cohorts. Moreover, the complete loss of p-RKIP was an independent prognostic factor using multivariate analysis in operable invasive ductal breast cancer. We show for the first time that ER, partly, drives RKIP expression through MTA3-Snail axis. Consistent with this finding, we found that, at the mRNA level, RKIP expression varied significantly across the different molecular subtypes of breast cancer with the Luminal (ER+) subtype expressing high levels of RKIP and the more aggressive Claudin-low (ER-) subtype, which depicted the highest epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) registered the lowest RKIP expression levels. In conclusion, loss of expression/diminution of RKIP or its phosphorylated form is associated with poor diseases-free survival in breast cancer. Determining the expression of RKIP and p-RKIP adds significant prognostic value to the management and subtyping of this disease.