We have previously shown that bile acids (BAs) accelerate carcinogenic processes in pancreatic cancer (PC) in which mucin 4 (MUC4) expression has a central role. However, the roles of other mucin isoforms in PC are less clear, especially in bile-induced cancer progression. The study aim was to investigate expression of MUC17 in a BAs- or human serum-treated pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) cell line and use different assays with RNA silencing to study the role of MUC17 in cancer

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... on. Protein expression of MUC17 was evaluated in 52 human pancreatic samples by immunohistochemistry, and Kaplan–Meier survival analysis was used to compare survival curves. Expression of MUC17 increased in PDAC patients, especially in obstructive jaundice (OJ). A significant association was found between elevated MUC17 expression and poorer overall survival in the PDAC + OJ group. Treatment of PDAC cells with BAs or with human serum obtained from PDAC + OJ patients enhanced the expression of MUC17, whereas knockdown of MUC17 alone or in combination with MUC4 decreased BAs-induced carcinogenic processes. Our results demonstrated that MUC17 has a central role in bile-induced PC progression, and in addition to MUC4, this isoform also can be used as a novel prognostic biomarker.