Downregulation of Polo-Like Kinase 4 in Hepatocellular Carcinoma Associates with Poor Prognosis

Polo-like kinase 4 (PLK4), belonging to serine/threonine kinase family, is critical for centriole replication and cell cycle progression. PLK4 has been proposed as a tumor suppressor in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). However, its expression and significance in HCC have not been well studied. In the present study, we found that PLK4 was markedly downregulated in both HCC cell lines and fresh cancer tissues, using quantitative real-time-PCR and western blot. Immunohistochemistry data also revealed that decreased expression of PLK4 was present in 72.4% (178/246) of HCC tissues, compared with the corresponding adjacent nontumorous tissues. Furthermore, PLK4 expression significantly correlated with clinicopathological parameters, including clinical stage (P = 0.034), serum α-fetoprotein (AFP) (P = 0.019) and tumor size (P = 0.032). Moreover, HCC patients with low PLK4 expression survived shorter than those with high PLK4 expression, as indicated by overall survival (P = 0.002) and disease-free survival (P = 0.012) assessed by the Kaplan–Meier method. In addition, multivariate analysis suggested PLK4 as an independent predictor of overall survival (HR, 0.556; 95%CI, 0.376−0.822; P = 0.003) and disease-free survival (HR, 0.547; 95%CI, 0.382−0.783; P = 0.001). Collectively, our study demonstrated that PLK4 was remarkably downregulated in HCC and could be served as a potential prognostic marker for patients with this deadly disease.