Subsequently to the publication of the above article, and a Corrigendum that has already been published with the intention of showing corrected versions of Figs. 3 and 6 (DOI: 10.3892/ijo.2018.4254; published online on January 24, 2018), a concerned reader drew to the Editor's attention that there appeared to be an unexpected overlap of data in a couple of the panels showing flow cytometric data in Fig. 3A; furthermore, strikingly similar data also appeared in a paper that was submitted to the journal Cancer Gene Therapy at around the same time [Zang W, Wang T, Huang J, Li M, Wang Y, Du Y, Chen X and Zhao G: Long noncoding RNA PEG10 regulates proliferation and invasion of esophageal cancer cells. Cancer Gene Ther 22: 138‑144, 2015]. Considering the latest discrepancies and concerns that have been raised with another of the figures in this paper, the Editor of International Journal of Oncology has decided that the article should be retracted from the publication. The authors were asked for an explanation to account for these concerns, but the Editorial Office did not receive a reply. The Editor apologizes to the readership of the Journal for any inconvenience caused. [International Journal of Oncology 46: 2163‑2171, 2015; DOI: 10.3892/ijo.2015.2900].
Keywords: apoptosis; esophageal carcinoma; invasion; miRNA-1207-5p; stomatin-like protein 2.