Fig. 9: TAK-981 blocks tumor growth in a mouse model with conditional SS18::SSX expression.

A Schema of the design of the mouse experiment⁹² (created in BioRender. Floros, K. (2025)). B hSS2 mice were treated with 25 mg/kg 3/w or vehicle (control) and tumors were monitored by caliper at least 3/w (n = 5 for control and n = 9 for the TAK-981 treatment cohort) (n: number of tumors). The data were presented as mean values + SEM. Unpaired two-tailed t test was performed and the p value for the comparison between control and TAK-981-treated tumors was calculated, p = 0.0002. C Waterfall plot of data from (B). D Individual tumor growth from the experiment shown in (B, C). E Heatmap of the RNA expression profiles of the 1000 most differentiated genes following TAK-981 treatment, after RNA-seq analysis in the indicated hSS2 tumors (n = 3 for control and n = 6 for TAK-981 treatment). F Pathway analysis of RNA-seq data from hSS2 tumors. G Venn diagrams of significant gene changes caused by TAK-981 in hSS2 mice and the 100 most up- or down-regulated genes in vitro following SS18::SSX knockdown in HS-SY-II cells by Banito et al.²². H Volcano plot of the 100 most down- or upregulated genes following SS18::SSX knockdown in vitro by Banito et al.²² plotted with the commonly downregulated genes (dark purple dots) or commonly upregulated genes (dark blue dots) after RNA-seq in the hSS2 tumors. The p values were adjusted using a False Discovery Rate (FDR) multiple testing correction method. I Representative tumors from the control and the TAK-981-treated cohort were harvested 2–3 h after the last TAK-981 administration and tumor lysates were subjected to western blot analysis and probed for the indicated proteins. J Representative images of IHC analysis of the indicated antibodies for control and TAK-981-treated tumors from the hSS2 mouse experiment. Scale bars = 100 μm. K H-scores of staining with the indicated antibodies from (J). Exact p values and source data can be found in the Source Data.