YKT6 promotes breast cancer progression and is associated with poor prognosis and immune infiltration

Background: YKT6 is markedly overexpressed across multiple tumor types and plays a role in driving their progression. However, the correlation between YKT6 and breast cancer remains poorly understood. Therefore, we aimed to investigate the potential prognostic value and biological function of YKT6 gene in breast cancer. Methods: Public datasets, clinic sample and tissue microarray (TMA) were used for YKT6 expression and prognostic value analyses. The relevance between YKT6 expression, tumor-immune infiltrates and tumor mutation burden (TMB) was examined using the TCGA database. Cellular functional assays were performed to verify the biological behavior of YKT6 in breast cancer cells. Moreover, transcriptome sequencing (RNA-seq) was conducted to explore the underlying mechanism of YKT6. Results: YKT6 was significantly upregulated in breast cancer tissue comparing to normal tissue(P<0.05) and higher YKT6 expression was significantly linked to worse clinical prognosis, advanced tumor stages, and distant metastasis(P<0.05). Additionally, YKT6 expression is correlated with the infiltration of various immune cell and TMB. Knockdown of YKT6 impaired the proliferation, invasion, and migration abilities of breast cancer cells, and increased apoptosis. Functional enrichment analysis revealed that YKT6 primarily influenced breast cancer progression through the cell cycle, as well as biological processes such as autophagy, apoptosis, and ferroptosis. Moreover, knockdown of YKT6 suppressed the activity of mTORC1. Conclusion: YKT6 may serve as a potential prognostic biomarker for breast cancer. The expression level of YKT6 was correlated with tumor-infiltrating immune cells in breast cancer. It may offer potential value for the treatment of breast cancer patients.