Long Non-Coding RNA LEF1-AS1 Promotes Migration, Invasion and Metastasis of Colon Cancer Cells Through miR-30-5p/SOX9 Axis [Retraction]

Sun T, Liu Z, Zhang R, et al. Onco Targets Ther. 2020;13:2957-2972.

We, the Editors and Publisher of OncoTargets and Therapy, have retracted the following article.

Concerns were raised about the integrity of the data in the article after it was found images from Figures 2, 3 and 7 have been duplicated with those from other unrelated articles. Specifically,

• Images for Figure 2E, T84, have been duplicated with images for Figure 2C; Figure 3; Figure 4D and Figure 5a from Hou A, Toh LX, Gan KH, Lee KJR, Manser E, Tong L. Rho GTPases and Regulation of Cell Migration and Polarization in Human Corneal Epithelial Cells. PLoS ONE. 2013;8(10):e77107. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0077107; Wang Y, Yin Y, Zhou H, Cao Y. miR‑639 is associated with advanced cancer stages and promotes proliferation and migration of nasopharyngeal carcinoma. Oncology Letters. 2018;16:6903-6909. https://doi.org/10.3892/ol.2018.9512; Zhao D, Zhang H, Long J, Li M. LncRNA SNHG7 Functions as an Oncogene in Cervical Cancer by Sponging miR-485-5p to Modulate JUND Expression. Onco Targets Ther. 2020;13:1677-1689. https://doi.org/10.2147/OTT.S237802 and Jiang H, Li Y, Li J, et al. Long noncoding RNA LSINCT5 promotes endometrial carcinoma cell proliferation, cycle, and invasion by promoting the Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway via HMGA2. Therapeutic Advances in Medical Oncology. 2019;11. https://doi.org/10.1177/1758835919874649, respectively.
• The image for Figure 2C, T84, LEF1-AS1, has been duplicated with the image for Figure 3B, HuCCT1, EV, 0 nm from Lu M, Qin X, Zhou Y, et al. Long non-coding RNA LINC00665 promotes gemcitabine resistance of Cholangiocarcinoma cells via regulating EMT and stemness properties through miR-424-5p/BCL9L axis. Cell Death Dis. 2021;12:72. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41419-020-03346-4.
• The images for Figure 2F, HT29, EV and T84, EV, have been duplicated with images for Figure 5D, miR-25-3p+LY294002 and miR-ctrl, respectively, from Wan W, Wan W, Long Y, et al. MiR-25-3p promotes malignant phenotypes of retinoblastoma by regulating PTEN/Akt pathway. Biomedicine & Pharmacotherapy. 2019;118:109111. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopha.2019.109111.
• The images for Figure 3C, sh-ctrl and sh-LEF1-AS-1, have been duplicated with images for Figure 3B, Anti-miR-ctrl and Figure 4I, Y79, from Wan W, et al. Biomedicine & Pharmacotherapy. 2019;118:109111.
• The images for Figure 3F, sh-ctrl and sh-LEF1-AS1-2, have been duplicated with images for Figure 6C, Src-1 and EV, respectively, from Zhou J, Zhang J, Xu M, Ke Z, Zhang W, Mai J. High SRC-1 and Twist1 expression predicts poor prognosis and promotes migration and invasion by inducing epithelial-mesenchymal transition in human nasopharyngeal carcinoma. PLoS ONE. 2019;14(4):e0215299. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0215299.
• The image for Figure 7D, sh-LEF1-AS1-1+EV, has been duplicated with the image for Figure 5H, miR-25-3p+PTEN, from Wan W, et al. Biomedicine & Pharmacotherapy. 2019;118:109111.

The authors did not respond to our queries and were unable to provide an explanation for the duplicated images or provide data for the study. As verifying the validity of published work is core to the integrity of the scholarly record, we are therefore retracting the article and the authors were notified of this.

We have been informed in our decision-making by our editorial policies and COPE guidelines.

The retracted article will remain online to maintain the scholarly record, but it will be digitally watermarked on each page as ‘Retracted’.