The results showed that ELK1 upregulation was tightly associated with the TNM stage, distant metastasis, and lymph node metastasis in patients with LUAD (p < 0.05), but not with sex, age, tumor size, smoking history, or differentiation degree (p > 0.05; Table 1). Here, ELK1 is linked to metastatic malignant neoplasm in the lymph nodes.