Gastric carcinoma is among the most prevalent malignancies, and a leading cause of cancer deaths worldwide. The Hippo pathway defines a novel signaling pathway regulating cell proliferation. The key factor in this kinase cascade is the transcriptional co-activator yes-associated protein (YAP), which is constitutively activated in various types of cancer, including gastric carcinoma. To determine the effect on SGC7901 gastric cancer cells after inhibition of the YAP expression, we used lentivirus-derived small hairpin RNA (shRNA) against YAP. The YAP-specific shRNA significantly suppressed YAP expression at the mRNA and protein levels, reduced cancer cell proliferation and promoted cancer cell apoptosis. It was also found that YAP knockdown significantly increased the G0/G1 cell population and reduced expression levels of a number of genes crucial to cell proliferation and apoptosis, including Ki-67, proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA), survivin and cyclin D1. Thus, our data suggested that knockdown of YAP expression plays a significant role in gastric cancer cell proliferation and apoptosis. Therefore, the YAP gene serves as a potential therapeutic target in gastric cancers.

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