Immunoblotting Analysis of EMT Markers

Western blotting was performed as previously described^{37 (link)}. The antibodies used in this study were E-cadherin (24E10, Cell Signaling Technology, USA), MMP9 (D6O3H, Cell Signaling Technology, USA), MMP2 (D4M2N Cell Signaling Technology, USA), vimentin (D21H3, Cell Signaling Technology, USA), PTEN (D4.3, Cell Signaling Technology, USA), p-PTEN (44A7, Cell Signaling Technology, USA), STAT3 (D3Z2G, Cell Signaling Technology, USA), p-STAT3 (D3A7, Cell Signaling Technology, USA), snail (C15D3, Cell Signaling Technology, USA), and GAPDH (D16H11, Cell Signaling Technology, USA). GAPDH was used as an internal control. The immunoreactive bands were visualized with ECL Ultra (New Cell and Molecular Biotech, Suzhou, China). All western blots were repeated three times with separate cell lysates and the statistical analysis were provided in the supplementary figures.