Oncotarget

Retraction:

Retraction: Silencing of BAG3 inhibits the epithelial-mesenchymal transition in human cervical cancer

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Oncotarget. 2025; 16:219-219. https://doi.org/10.18632/oncotarget.28708

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Fei Song1, Geng Wang2, Zhifang Ma3, Yuebing Ma3 and Yingying Wang3

1Department of General Surgery, Shandong Provincial Third Hospital, Jinan, Shandong, China
2Department of Emergency, Laiwu City People’s Hospital, Laiwu, Shandong, China
3Department of Gynecologic Oncology, Shandong Cancer Hospital Affiliated to Shandong University, Shandong Academy of Medical Sciences, Jinan, Shandong, China

Published: March 21, 2025

Copyright: © 2025 Song et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

This article has been retracted: An Oncotarget investigation of this paper revealed overlapping invasion assay images in Figure 4A with those in Figure 4A of an earlier published paper from a different institution [1]. Additionally, Figure 4B contains manipulated western blot images previously used in Figures 4A and B of a second, unrelated publication [2]. We also found that the western blot of GAPDH expression in HeLa cells in Figure 4B is a duplicate of the GAPDH image from LoVo cells in Figure 3A of an unrelated 2013 paper [3]. Furthermore, the authors reused western blot Bag3 image from SiHa cells in Figure 2A in 2018 paper [4] to illustrate Bag3 expression in the tumor tissues.

Corresponding author Yingying Wang has since contacted Oncotarget to request a retraction of the paper, expressing the concern that the similarities between the figures in their study and previous studies raise doubts about the validity of their conclusions.

In light of these facts, the Editorial decision was made to retract the paper. We have received confirmation from all authors that they agree with this decision.

REFERENCES

1. Yuan Z, Chen D, Chen X, Yang H, Wei Y. Overexpression of trefoil factor 3 (TFF3) contributes to the malignant progression in cervical cancer cells. Cancer Cell Int. 2017; 17:7. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12935-016-0379-1. [PubMed]

2. Liu Q, Yang P, Tu K, Zhang H, Zheng X, Yao Y, Liu Q. TPX2 knockdown suppressed hepatocellular carcinoma cell invasion via inactivating AKT signaling and inhibiting MMP2 and MMP9 expression. Chin J Cancer Res. 2014; 26:410–17. https://doi.org/10.3978/j.issn.1000-9604.2014.08.01. [PubMed]

3. Tang W, Zhu Y, Gao J, Fu J, Liu C, Liu Y, Song C, Zhu S, Leng Y, Wang G, Chen W, Du P, Huang S, et al. MicroRNA-29a promotes colorectal cancer metastasis by regulating matrix metalloproteinase 2 and E-cadherin via KLF4. Br J Cancer. 2014; 110:450–58. https://doi.org/10.1038/bjc.2013.724. [PubMed]

4. Wang Y, Tian Y. miR-206 Inhibits Cell Proliferation, Migration, and Invasion by Targeting BAG3 in Human Cervical Cancer. Oncol Res. 2018; 26:923–31. https://doi.org/10.3727/096504017X15143731031009. [PubMed]

Original article: Oncotarget. 2017; 8:95392-95400. DOI: https://doi.org/10.18632/oncotarget.20726.


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