Abstract

It has been reported before that acidic leucine-rich nuclear phosphoprotein 32 family member B (ANP32B) plays roles in many cancers, yet no report of its role in lung cancer exists. In this study, we documented an elevation of ANP32B within lung cancer tissues and cells. Knockdown of ANP32B hindered the proliferation as well as migration of lung cancer cells, whereas overexpression of ANP32B helps to promote the malignant progression of lung cancer. ANP32B also regulates lung cancer cells’ apoptosis and cell cycling. In addition, voltage-dependent anion channel 1 (VDAC1) has been found to be a downstream targeted gene of ANP32B and is positively regulated by ANP32B in lung cancer cells. According to our research, the expression of VDAC1 was positively associated with ANP32B expression in lung adenocarcinoma (r = 0.61, P  < 0.001) samples by Pearson’s correlation coefficient analysis. Furthermore, rescue experiments demonstrated that VDAC1 could rescue the effect of ANP32B expression on lung cancer cell proliferation and migration. Our results suggest that ANP32B overexpression facilitates lung cancer progression by increasing the expression of VDAC1. As such, we have revealed a novel mechanism regulating the connection between ANP32B and VDAC1 and a potential role of ANP32B as an oncogene and a clinical therapeutic target in lung cancer.