scholarly journals Spatial Maps of Hepatocellular Carcinoma Transcriptomes Highlight an Unexplored Landscape of Heterogeneity and a Novel Gene Signature for Survival

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nan Zhao ◽  
Yanhui Zhang ◽  
Runfen Cheng ◽  
Danfang Zhang ◽  
Fan Li ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Hepatocellular Carcinoma ◽  
Drug Targets ◽  
Marker Gene ◽  
Risk Groups ◽  
Gene Signature ◽  
Low Risk ◽  
Marker Genes ◽  
Specific Marker ◽  
Gene Profiles

Abstract Background: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) are often present with satellite nodules, rendering current curative treatments ineffective in many patients. The heterogeneity of HCC is a major challenge in personalized medicine. The emergence of spatial transcriptomics (ST) provides a powerful strategy for delineating the complex molecular landscapes of tumors. Methods: In this study, we investigated tissue-wide gene expression heterogeneity in tumor and adjacent nonneoplastic tissues using ST technology. We analyzed the transcriptomes of nearly 10820 tissue regions and identified main gene expression clusters and their specific marker genes (differentially expressed genes, DEGs) in patients. The DEGs were analyzed from two perspectives. First of all, we identified two distinct gene profiles associated with satellite nodules and conducted a more comprehensive analysis for both gene profiles. Their clinical relevance for human HCC was validated with KM Plotter. Secondly, we screened DEGs with TCGA database to divide the HCC cohort into high- and low-risk groups according to Cox analysis. HCC patients from the ICGC cohort were used for validation. Kaplan Meier analysis was used to compare the overall survival (OS) between high- and low-risk groups. Univariate and multivariate Cox analyses were applied to determine the independent predictors for OS. Results: Novel markers for the prediction of satellite nodules and a tumor clusters specific marker genes signature model(6 genes) for HCC prognosis was constructed, respectively. Conclusion: The establishment of marker gene profiles may be an important step towards an unbiased view of HCC and the 6-genes signature can be used for prognostic prediction in HCC. This analysis will help us to clarify one of the possible soucres of HCC heterogeneity, uncover pathogenic mechanisms and novel anti-tumor drug targets.

289 COOPERATIVE EXPRESSION OF PLURIPOTENCY-RELATED GENES AND NEURAL CREST MARKER GENES IN PORCINE GFP-TRANSGENIC SKIN-DERIVED PROGENITORS

2009 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 241
Author(s):  
M. T. Zhao ◽  
C. S. Isom ◽  
J. G. Zhao ◽  
Y. H. Hao ◽  
J. Ross ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Stem Cells ◽  
Neural Crest ◽  
Therapeutic Potential ◽  
Marker Gene ◽  
Stem Cell Marker ◽  
Marker Genes ◽  
Specific Marker ◽  
Marker Gene Expression ◽  
Neural Crest Origin

Recently neural crest derived multipotent progenitors from skin have attracted much attention as the skin may provide an accessible, autologous source of stem cells available with therapeutic potential (Toma JG et al. 2001 Nat. Cell Biol. 3, 778–784). The multipotent property of stem cells could be tracked back to the expression of specific marker genes that are exclusively expressed in multipotent stem cells rather than any other types of differentiated cells. Here we demonstrate the property of multipotency and neural crest origin of porcine GFP-transgenic skin derived progenitors (termed pSKP) in vitro by marker gene expression analysis. The pSKP cells were isolated from the back skin of GFP transgenic fetuses by serum-free selection culture in the presence of EGF (20 ng mL–1) and bFGF (40 ng mL–1), and developed into spheres in 1–2 weeks (Dyce PW et al. 2004 Biochem. Biophy. Res. Commun. 316, 651–658). Three groups of RT-PCR primers were used on total RNA from purified pSKP cells: pluripotency related genes (Oct4, Sox2, Nanog, Stat3), neural crest marker genes (p75NGFR, Slug, Twist, Pax3, Sox9, Sox10) and lineage specific genes (GFAP, tubulin β-III, leptin). Expression of both pluripotency related genes and neural crest marker genes were detected in undifferentiated pSKP cells. In addition, transcripts for fibronectin, vimentin and nestin (neural stem cell marker) were also present. The percentage of positive cells for Oct4, fibronection and vimentin were 12.3%, 67.9% and 53.7% respectively. Differentiation assays showed the appearance of tubulin β-III positive (39.4%) and GFAP-positive (42.6%) cells in cultures by immunocytochemistry, which share the characteristics of neurons and glial cells, respectively. Thus, we confirm the multiple lineage potentials and neural crest origin of pSKP cells in the level of marker gene expression. This work was funded by National Institutes of Health National Center for Research Resources RR013438.

scholarly journals The Landscape of Glycosyltransferase Gene Signature for Overall Survival Prediction in Hepatocellular Carcinoma

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qiang Cai ◽  
Shizhe Yu ◽  
Jian Zhao ◽  
Duo Ma ◽  
Long Jiang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Hepatocellular Carcinoma ◽  
Overall Survival ◽  
Risk Score ◽  
Prognostic Value ◽  
Cox Regression ◽  
Risk Groups ◽  
Gene Signature ◽  
Low Risk ◽  
Regression Analyses ◽  
Risk Patients

Abstract Background: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is heterogeneous disease occurring in the background of chronic liver diseases. The role of glycosyltransferase (GT) genes have recently been the focus of research associating with the development of tumors. However, the prognostic value of GT genes in HCC remains not elucidated. This study aimed to demonstrate the GT genes related to the prognosis of HCC through bioinformatics analysis.Methods: The GT genes signatures were identified from the training set of The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) dataset using univariate and the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) Cox regression analyses. Then, we analyzed the prognostic value of GT genes signatures related to the overall survival (OS) of HCC patients. A prognostic model was constructed, and the risk score of each patient was calculated as formula, which divided HCC patients into high- and low-risk groups. Kaplan-Meier (K-M) and Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were used to assess the OS of HCC patients. The prognostic value of GT genes signatures was further investigated in the validation set of TCGA database. Univariate and multivariate Cox regression analyses were performed to demonstrate the independent factors on OS. Finally, we utilized the gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA) to annotate the function of these genes between the two risk categories. Results: In this study, we identified and validated 4 GT genes as the prognostic signatures. The K-M analysis showed that the survival rate of the high-risk patients was significantly lower than that of the low-risk patients. The risk score calculated with 4 gene signatures could predict OS for 3-, 5-, and 7-year in patients with HCC, revealing the prognostic ability of these gene signature. In addition, Multivariate Cox regression analyses indicated that the risk score was an independent prognostic factor for HCC. Functional analysis further revealed that immune-related pathways were enriched, and immune status in HCC were different between the two risk groups.Conclusion: In conclusion, a novel GT genes signature can be used for prognostic prediction in HCC. Thus, targeting GT genes may be a therapeutic alternative for HCC.

scholarly journals Detection of condition-specific marker genes from RNA-seq data with MGFR

PeerJ ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. e6970 ◽  
Author(s):  
Khadija El Amrani ◽  
Gregorio Alanis-Lobato ◽  
Nancy Mah ◽  
Andreas Kurtz ◽  
Miguel A. Andrade-Navarro
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Marker Gene ◽  
Cell Types ◽  
The Other ◽  
Marker Genes ◽  
Specific Marker ◽  
Sample Type ◽  
Rna Seq ◽  
Cell Fate Decisions ◽  
Daunting Task

The identification of condition-specific genes is key to advancing our understanding of cell fate decisions and disease development. Differential gene expression analysis (DGEA) has been the standard tool for this task. However, the amount of samples that modern transcriptomic technologies allow us to study, makes DGEA a daunting task. On the other hand, experiments with low numbers of replicates lack the statistical power to detect differentially expressed genes. We have previously developed MGFM, a tool for marker gene detection from microarrays, that is particularly useful in the latter case. Here, we have adapted the algorithm behind MGFM to detect markers in RNA-seq data. MGFR groups samples with similar gene expression levels and flags potential markers of a sample type if their highest expression values represent all replicates of this type. We have benchmarked MGFR against other methods and found that its proposed markers accurately characterize the functional identity of different tissues and cell types in standard and single cell RNA-seq datasets. Then, we performed a more detailed analysis for three of these datasets, which profile the transcriptomes of different human tissues, immune and human blastocyst cell types, respectively. MGFR’s predicted markers were compared to gold-standard lists for these datasets and outperformed the other marker detectors. Finally, we suggest novel candidate marker genes for the examined tissues and cell types. MGFR is implemented as a freely available Bioconductor package (https://doi.org/doi:10.18129/B9.bioc.MGFR), which facilitates its use and integration with bioinformatics pipelines.

scholarly journals Multi-view feature selection for identifying gene markers: a diversified biological data driven approach

2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (S18) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sudipta Acharya ◽  
Laizhong Cui ◽  
Yi Pan
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Feature Selection ◽  
Gene Selection ◽  
Marker Gene ◽  
Biological Data ◽  
Protein Interaction Data ◽  
Marker Genes ◽  
Data Sets ◽  
Gene Markers ◽  
Multi Objective

Abstract Background In recent years, to investigate challenging bioinformatics problems, the utilization of multiple genomic and proteomic sources has become immensely popular among researchers. One such issue is feature or gene selection and identifying relevant and non-redundant marker genes from high dimensional gene expression data sets. In that context, designing an efficient feature selection algorithm exploiting knowledge from multiple potential biological resources may be an effective way to understand the spectrum of cancer or other diseases with applications in specific epidemiology for a particular population. Results In the current article, we design the feature selection and marker gene detection as a multi-view multi-objective clustering problem. Regarding that, we propose an Unsupervised Multi-View Multi-Objective clustering-based gene selection approach called UMVMO-select. Three important resources of biological data (gene ontology, protein interaction data, protein sequence) along with gene expression values are collectively utilized to design two different views. UMVMO-select aims to reduce gene space without/minimally compromising the sample classification efficiency and determines relevant and non-redundant gene markers from three cancer gene expression benchmark data sets. Conclusion A thorough comparative analysis has been performed with five clustering and nine existing feature selection methods with respect to several internal and external validity metrics. Obtained results reveal the supremacy of the proposed method. Reported results are also validated through a proper biological significance test and heatmap plotting.

scholarly journals A prognostic model based on seven immune-related genes predicts the overall survival of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma

2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Qian Yan ◽  
Wenjiang Zheng ◽  
Boqing Wang ◽  
Baoqian Ye ◽  
Huiyan Luo ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Hepatocellular Carcinoma ◽  
Overall Survival ◽  
High Risk ◽  
Risk Score ◽  
Immune Cells ◽  
Prognostic Model ◽  
Risk Groups ◽  
Low Risk ◽  
Prognostic Performance ◽  
Immune Related Genes

Abstract Background Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a disease with a high incidence and a poor prognosis. Growing amounts of evidence have shown that the immune system plays a critical role in the biological processes of HCC such as progression, recurrence, and metastasis, and some have discussed using it as a weapon against a variety of cancers. However, the impact of immune-related genes (IRGs) on the prognosis of HCC remains unclear. Methods Based on The Cancer Gene Atlas (TCGA) and Immunology Database and Analysis Portal (ImmPort) datasets, we integrated the ribonucleic acid (RNA) sequencing profiles of 424 HCC patients with IRGs to calculate immune-related differentially expressed genes (DEGs). Survival analysis was used to establish a prognostic model of survival- and immune-related DEGs. Based on genomic and clinicopathological data, we constructed a nomogram to predict the prognosis of HCC patients. Gene set enrichment analysis further clarified the signalling pathways of the high-risk and low-risk groups constructed based on the IRGs in HCC. Next, we evaluated the correlation between the risk score and the infiltration of immune cells, and finally, we validated the prognostic performance of this model in the GSE14520 dataset. Results A total of 100 immune-related DEGs were significantly associated with the clinical outcomes of patients with HCC. We performed univariate and multivariate least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (Lasso) regression analyses on these genes to construct a prognostic model of seven IRGs (Fatty Acid Binding Protein 6 (FABP6), Microtubule-Associated Protein Tau (MAPT), Baculoviral IAP Repeat Containing 5 (BIRC5), Plexin-A1 (PLXNA1), Secreted Phosphoprotein 1 (SPP1), Stanniocalcin 2 (STC2) and Chondroitin Sulfate Proteoglycan 5 (CSPG5)), which showed better prognostic performance than the tumour/node/metastasis (TNM) staging system. Moreover, we constructed a regulatory network related to transcription factors (TFs) that further unravelled the regulatory mechanisms of these genes. According to the median value of the risk score, the entire TCGA cohort was divided into high-risk and low-risk groups, and the low-risk group had a better overall survival (OS) rate. To predict the OS rate of HCC, we established a gene- and clinical factor-related nomogram. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve, concordance index (C-index) and calibration curve showed that this model had moderate accuracy. The correlation analysis between the risk score and the infiltration of six common types of immune cells showed that the model could reflect the state of the immune microenvironment in HCC tumours. Conclusion Our IRG prognostic model was shown to have value in the monitoring, treatment, and prognostic assessment of HCC patients and could be used as a survival prediction tool in the near future.

scholarly journals Analysis of blood-based gene expression in idiopathic Parkinson disease

Neurology ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 89 (16) ◽  
pp. 1676-1683 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ron Shamir ◽  
Christine Klein ◽  
David Amar ◽  
Eva-Juliane Vollstedt ◽  
Michael Bonin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Parkinson Disease ◽  
Gene Networks ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Expression Profiles ◽  
Area Under The Curve ◽  
Gene Expression Profiles ◽  
Gene Signature ◽  
Gene Profiles ◽  
Independent Test

Objective:To examine whether gene expression analysis of a large-scale Parkinson disease (PD) patient cohort produces a robust blood-based PD gene signature compared to previous studies that have used relatively small cohorts (≤220 samples).Methods:Whole-blood gene expression profiles were collected from a total of 523 individuals. After preprocessing, the data contained 486 gene profiles (n = 205 PD, n = 233 controls, n = 48 other neurodegenerative diseases) that were partitioned into training, validation, and independent test cohorts to identify and validate a gene signature. Batch-effect reduction and cross-validation were performed to ensure signature reliability. Finally, functional and pathway enrichment analyses were applied to the signature to identify PD-associated gene networks.Results:A gene signature of 100 probes that mapped to 87 genes, corresponding to 64 upregulated and 23 downregulated genes differentiating between patients with idiopathic PD and controls, was identified with the training cohort and successfully replicated in both an independent validation cohort (area under the curve [AUC] = 0.79, p = 7.13E–6) and a subsequent independent test cohort (AUC = 0.74, p = 4.2E–4). Network analysis of the signature revealed gene enrichment in pathways, including metabolism, oxidation, and ubiquitination/proteasomal activity, and misregulation of mitochondria-localized genes, including downregulation of COX4I1, ATP5A1, and VDAC3.Conclusions:We present a large-scale study of PD gene expression profiling. This work identifies a reliable blood-based PD signature and highlights the importance of large-scale patient cohorts in developing potential PD biomarkers.

Exploring Prognostic Signatures of Hepatocellular Carcinoma and the potential implications in Tumor Immune Microenvironment

2021 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hongxu Chen ◽  
Zhijing Jiang ◽  
Bingshi Yang ◽  
Guiling Yan ◽  
Xiaochen Wang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Survival Analysis ◽  
Liver Cancer ◽  
Gene Expression Data ◽  
Immune Cells ◽  
Roc Curve ◽  
Prognostic Model ◽  
Risk Groups ◽  
Low Risk ◽  
Expression Data

Objective: The objective of this study is to construct a prognostic model using genetic markers of liver cancer and explore the signature genes associated with the tumor immune microenviroment. Methods: Cox proportional hazards regression analysis was carried out to screen the significant HR using dataset of TCGA Liver Cancer (LIHC) gene expression data, then LASSO (Least absolute shrinkage and selection operator) was performed to select the minimal variables with significant HR of genes. Thus, the prognostic model was constructed by the minimal variables with their HR and time-dependent receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) curve and area under the ROC curve (AUC) value used to assess the prognostic performance. Then dividing the patients into high and low risk groups by the median of the model, survival analysis was performed by two groups with testing and independent dataset. Furthermore, enrichment analysis of signature mRNAs and lncRNAs and their co-expression genes were performed, then, spearman rank correlation used to calculate the correlation between immune cells and genes in the prognostic model, and testing abundance difference of the immune cells in high and low risks groups. Results: A total of 5989 genes with significant HR were identified, then 6 key genes (three mRNAs: DHX37, SMIM7 and MFSD1, three lncRNAs: PIWIL4, KCNE5 and LOC100128398) screened by LASSO were used to construct the model with their HR value respectively. The AUC values of 1 and 5 year overall survival were 0.78 and 0.76 in discovery data and 0.67 and 0.68 in testing data. Survival analysis performed significantly in discriminating high and low groups with testing and independent data. Furthermore, many immune cells such as nTreg found a significant correlation with the genes in the prognostic model, and many immune cells show significantly different abundance in high and low risk groups. Conclusion: In the study, we used Univariate Cox analyses and LASSO algorithm with TCGA gene expression data to construct the prognostic model in liver cancer patients. And the prognostic model comprising three mRNAs including DHX37, SMIM7, MFSD1, and three lncRNAs including PIWIL4, KCNE5 and LOC100128398. Furthermore, these genes expression levels were associated with the abundance of some immune cells, such as nTreg. Also, many immune cells have significantly different abundance in high and low risk groups. All these results indicated combination with all these six genes could be the potential biomarker for the prognosis of liver cancer.

scholarly journals A Nomogram Based on a Three-Gene Signature Derived from AATF Coexpressed Genes Predicts Overall Survival of Hepatocellular Carcinoma Patients

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Jun Liu ◽  
Jianjun Lu ◽  
Zhanzhong Ma ◽  
Wenli Li
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Hepatocellular Carcinoma ◽  
Overall Survival ◽  
Clinical Practice ◽  
Correlation Coefficient ◽  
Cox Regression ◽  
Prognostic Significance ◽  
Gene Signature ◽  
Cancer Genome ◽  
Survival Prediction

Background. Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a common cancer with an extremely high mortality rate. Therefore, there is an urgent need in screening key biomarkers of HCC to predict the prognosis and develop more individual treatments. Recently, AATF is reported to be an important factor contributing to HCC. Methods. We aimed to establish a gene signature to predict overall survival of HCC patients. Firstly, we examined the expression level of AATF in the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO), the Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), and the International Union of Cancer Genome (ICGC) databases. Genes coexpressed with AATF were identified in the TCGA dataset by the Poisson correlation coefficient and used to establish a gene signature for survival prediction. The prognostic significance of this gene signature was then validated in the ICGC dataset and used to build a combined prognostic model for clinical practice. Results. Gene expression data and clinical information of 2521 HCC patients were downloaded from three public databases. AATF expression in HCC tissue was higher than that in matched normal liver tissues. 644 genes coexpressed with AATF were identified by the Poisson correlation coefficient and used to establish a three-gene signature (KIF20A, UCK2, and SLC41A3) by the univariate and multivariate least absolute shrinkage and selection operator Cox regression analyses. This three-gene signature was then used to build a combined nomogram for clinical practice. Conclusion. This integrated nomogram based on the three-gene signature can predict overall survival for HCC patients well. The three-gene signature may be a potential therapeutic target in HCC.

scholarly journals Tracing the Stemness of Porcine Skin-Derived Progenitors (pSKP) Back to Specific Marker Gene Expression

2009 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 111-122 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mingtao Zhao ◽  
S. Clay Isom ◽  
Hui Lin ◽  
Yanhong Hao ◽  
Yong Zhang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Marker Gene ◽  
Specific Marker ◽  
Porcine Skin ◽  
Marker Gene Expression

Integrated Transcriptomic Analysis of Necrosis-related Gene in Diffuse Gliomas

2019 ◽  
Vol 80 (04) ◽  
pp. 240-249
Author(s):  
Jiajia Wang ◽  
Jie Ma
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
High Risk ◽  
Differentially Expressed Genes ◽  
Expression Profiles ◽  
Prognostic Index ◽  
Gene Expression Profiles ◽  
Risk Groups ◽  
Low Risk ◽  
Differentially Expressed ◽  
Low Grade

Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM), an aggressive brain tumor, is characterized histologically by the presence of a necrotic center surrounded by so-called pseudopalisading cells. Pseudopalisading necrosis has long been used as a prognostic feature. However, the underlying molecular mechanism regulating the progression of GBMs remains unclear. We hypothesized that the gene expression profiles of individual cancers, specifically necrosis-related genes, would provide objective information that would allow for the creation of a prognostic index. Gene expression profiles of necrotic and nonnecrotic areas were obtained from the Ivy Glioblastoma Atlas Project (IVY GAP) database to explore the differentially expressed genes.A robust signature of seven genes was identified as a predictor for glioblastoma and low-grade glioma (GBM/LGG) in patients from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) cohort. This set of genes was able to stratify GBM/LGG and GBM patients into high-risk and low-risk groups in the training set as well as the validation set. The TCGA, Repository for Molecular Brain Neoplasia Data (Rembrandt), and GSE16011 databases were then used to validate the expression level of these seven genes in GBMs and LGGs. Finally, the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in the high-risk and low-risk groups were subjected to gene ontology enrichment, Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes pathway, and gene set enrichment analyses, and they revealed that these DEGs were associated with immune and inflammatory responses. In conclusion, our study identified a novel seven-gene signature that may guide the prognostic prediction and development of therapeutic applications.

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