Decreased expression of eukaryotic initiation factor 3f is an adverse prognostic factor for stage I–III gastric cancer

Li, Guanghua; Wang, Na; Sun, Chuanjin; Li, Bo

The eukaryotic initiation factor 3f (eIF3f ) is the p47 subunit of the multi-subunit eIF3 complex and plays an important role in translation initiation [9] [10] [11] . Although the role of eIF3f in the eIF3 complex has not been defined [12] [13] [14] , shut-off experiments in Schizosaccharomyces pombe showed that in a long-term period, eIF3f was essential for viability [15] . The translation system indicated that, in mammalian cells, eIF3f was a negative regulator of translation, which played an important role in human cancer [12, 16] . A study by Marchione et al. showed that the f subunit of eIF3 represented a promising candidate molecule to use for bio-therapeutic applications [17] . Previous studies have identified eIF3f as a protein involved in apoptotic signaling as a negative regulator of translation and have also demonstrated that eIF3f expression significantly decreased in many human cancers, and thus played an important role in human cancer [11, 16, 18, 19] . Shi et al. reported that eIF3f was downregulated in several human tumors, and that its overexpression inhibited cell proliferation in melanoma and pancreatic cancer cells [11] . A recent study by Higareda-Mendoza and Pardo-Galván also showed that eIF3f was essential for A549 cell proliferation and its absence induced the cell to enter apoptosis [20] .