STMN1 and cancer: To validate effectiveness of down regulation of STMN-1 expression, we performed in vivo studies in nude mice; our results showed that STMN-1 shRNA could effectively down regulated STMN-1 expression by up to 85% in esophageal adenocarcinoma cells with great specificity (Figure 6C) indicating that the lentiviral-based RNAi, because of its potency, could be utilized as an effective strategy for cancer therapy.