Fig. 1

Aberrant mucin signatures in the stomach of GC patients compared to FD patients. A Relative mRNA expression of gastric (MUC1, MUC5AC, and MUC6; n = 100) and intestinal mucins (MUC2, MUC4, and MUC13; n = 100, 99, and 97, respectively) in gastric biopsies from FD patients (n = 20) and paired (highlighted by gray dashed lines) tumor and adjacent non-tumor tissues of 3 GC patient cohorts. Significant differences between FD, tumor, and adjacent non-tumor tissues are indicated by *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, ***P < 0.001, and ****P < 0.0001 (Wilcoxon rank-sum test). B The bar sizes represent the number of patients per mucine phenotype (null, n = 13; intestinal, n = 19; mixed, n = 47; null, n = 17) or expression level (i.e., high, mid, or low expression of MUC1, MUC5AC, MUC6, MUC2, MUC4, and MUC13). For each mucin expression level, the mean CNRQ (SD) is shown here: MUC1, high: 3.01 (2.05), mid: 1.07 (0.08), low: 0.46 (0.29); MUC5AC, high: 10.8 (9.04), mid: 1.38 (0.03), low: 0.13 (0.22); MUC6, high: 9.72 (10.82), mid: 1.39 (0.2), low: 0.11 (0.2); MUC2, high: 15.94 (25.98), mid:1.35 (0.13), low: 0.33 (0.28); MUC4, high: 14.72 (22.91), mid: 1.29 (0.19), low: 0.35 (0.3); and MUC13, high: 5.27 (2.88), mid: 1.56 (0.33), low: 0.47 (0.3). C PCA plot based on mucin mRNA expression in tumor and adjacent non-tumor tissues of 3 GC patient cohorts (n = 97–100). PC1 explains 38.5% of the variation; PC2 explains 21.57% of the variation. D Immunohistochemistry was assessed to analyze MUC1, MUC2, MUC5AC, MUC4, MUC6, and MUC13 protein expression in the different tissue types (n = 5 per tissue type; i.e., FD, adjacent non-tumor, and gastric adenocarcinomas with gastric, intestinal, mixed, or null mucin phenotypes). Representative images were selected. Pictures were taken at 20 × magnification and scale bars are 20 µm or 50 µm