Fig. 8

FAM3B overexpression increases tumorigenicity in vitro and tumor growth in nude mice. a Soft agar assay of colony formation, after cell culture during 21 days. FAM3B overexpressing DU145 cells led to the formation of larger and more abundant colonies when compared to control cells (upper panel). After Coomassie blue staining, number of colonies formed per well was quantified and plotted in the Y-axis bar (b) Representative mouse showing the largest tumor size observed in DU145/FAM3B animals as compared with a representative control animal. c Tumor growth was accompanied during 60 days, with tumor volume measured in time intervals as indicated. d Kaplan-Meier survival analysis exhibits the slightly accelerated tumor induced by FAM3B expression. e After dissection, tumors from mice were weighed and compared (f). HE analysis shows DU145/FAM3B tumors have more blood vessels (black arrows) and more hemorrhagic sites (white arrows) than control tumors suggesting a more angiogenic phenotype. All quantitative data are expressed as mean ± SD of tumor volumes of 3–5 animals in each experimental group, in three independent experiments. Statistical differences among groups were determined by Student’s t-test and one-way ANOVA test with Tukey’s pairwise comparisons (*p < 0.05, **p < 0.01)