The highly invasive and chemoresistant phenotype of pancreatic cancer highlights the urgency to identify prognostic biomarkers and novel therapeutic targets. Recently, we observed a significant correlation between shorter survival and loss of the cytoband 18q22.3. Here we investigated genes encoded by this cytoband, and demonstrated the prognostic value of CYB5A in resected and metastatic patients. Furthermore, our in vitro and in vivo studies clarified CYB5A inhibitory activity of oncogenic phenotypes through autophagy induction. This raises the possibility that inhibition of CYB5A-deregulated downstream pathways, such as those involving TRAF6, may favor autophagy-mediated cancer cell death in selected subgroups of patients.
Keywords: 18q22.3 cytoband; CYB5A; TRAF6; pancreatic cancer; prognosis.