scholarly journals Methylation-Based Signatures for Gastroesophageal Tumor Classification

Cancers ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (5) ◽  
pp. 1208 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nikolay Alabi ◽  
Dropen Sheka ◽  
Ashar Siddiqui ◽  
Edwin Wang

Contention exists within the field of oncology with regards to gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) tumors, as in the past, they have been classified as gastric cancer, esophageal cancer, or a combination of both. Misclassifications of GEJ tumors ultimately influence treatment options, which may be rendered ineffective if treating for the wrong cancer attributes. It has been suggested that misclassification rates were as high as 45%, which is greater than reported for junctional cancer occurrences. Here, we aimed to use the methylation profiles of GEJ tumors to improve classifications of GEJ tumors. Four cohorts of DNA methylation profiles, containing ~27,000 (27k) methylation sites per sample, were collected from the Gene Expression Omnibus and The Cancer Genome Atlas. Tumor samples were assigned into discovery (nEC = 185, nGC = 395; EC, esophageal cancer; GC gastric cancer) and validation (nEC = 179, nGC = 369) sets. The optimized Multi-Survival Screening (MSS) algorithm was used to identify methylation biomarkers capable of distinguishing GEJ tumors. Three methylation signatures were identified: They were associated with protein binding, gene expression, and cellular component organization cellular processes, and achieved precision and recall rates of 94.7% and 99.2%, 97.6% and 96.8%, and 96.8% and 97.6%, respectively, in the validation dataset. Interestingly, the methylation sites of the signatures were very close (i.e., 170–270 base pairs) to their downstream transcription start sites (TSSs), suggesting that the methylations near TSSs play much more important roles in tumorigenesis. Here we presented the first set of methylation signatures with a higher predictive power for characterizing gastroesophageal tumors. Thus, they could improve the diagnosis and treatment of gastroesophageal tumors.

Author(s):  
Jianwen Hu ◽  
Yanpeng Yang ◽  
Yongchen Ma ◽  
Yingze Ning ◽  
Guowei Chen ◽  
...  

Gastric cancer is one of the most heterogeneous tumors with multi-level molecular disturbances. Sustaining proliferative signaling and evading growth suppressors are two important hallmarks that enable the cancer cells to become tumorigenic and ultimately malignant, which enable tumor growth. Discovering and understanding the difference in tumor proliferation cycle phenotypes can be used to better classify tumors, and provide classification schemes for disease diagnosis and treatment options, which are more in line with the requirements of today’s precision medicine. We collected 691 eligible samples from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database, combined with transcriptome data, to explore different heterogeneous proliferation cycle phenotypes, and further study the potential genomic changes that may lead to these different phenotypes in this study. Interestingly, two subtypes with different clinical and biological characteristics were identified through cluster analysis of gastric cancer transcriptome data. The repeatability of the classification was confirmed in an independent Gene Expression Omnibus validation cohort, and consistent phenotypes were observed. These two phenotypes showed different clinical outcomes, and tumor mutation burden. This classification helped us to better classify gastric cancer patients and provide targeted treatment based on specific transcriptome data.


2021 ◽  
Vol 41 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Xianxue Zhang ◽  
Feng Yang ◽  
Zhenbao Wang

Abstract Immunotherapy is remarkably affected by the immune environment of the principal tumor. Nonetheless, the immune environment’s clinical relevance in stage IV gastric cancer (GC) is largely unknown. The gene expression profiles of 403 stage IV GC patients in the three cohorts: GEO (Gene Expression Omnibus, GSE84437 (n=292) and GSE62254 (n=77), and TCGA (The Cancer Genome Atlas, n=34) were used in the present study. Using four publicly available stage IV GC expression datasets, 29 immune signatures were expression profiled, and on this basis, we classified stage IV GC. The classification was conducted using the hierarchical clustering method. Three stage IV GC subtypes L, M, and H were identified representing low, medium, and high immunity, respectively. Immune correlation analysis of these three types revealed that Immune H exhibited a better prognostic outcome as well as a higher immune score compared with other subtypes. There was a noticeable difference in the three subgroups of HLA genes. Further, on comparing with other subtypes, CD86, CD80, CD274, CTLA4, PDCD1, and PDCD1LG2 had higher expression in the Immunity H subtype. In stage IV GC, potentially positive associations between immune and pathway activities were displayed, due to the enrichment of pathways including TNF signaling, Th-17 cell differentiation, and JAK-STAT signaling pathways in Immunity H vs Immunity L subtypes. External cohorts from TCGA cohort ratified these results. The identification of stage IV GC subtypes has potential clinical implications in stage IV GC treatment.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhen Xiong ◽  
Yao Lin ◽  
Yan Yu ◽  
Xianghui Zhou ◽  
Jun Fan ◽  
...  

BackgroundAlterations in lipid metabolism are increasingly being recognized. However, the application of lipid metabolism in the prognosis of gastric cancer (GC) has not yet been explored.MethodsA total of 204 lipid metabolism relative genes were analyzed in the GC cohort from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), and four independent cohorts from Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) and one cohort from Wuhan Union Hospital were applied for external validation. Differential expression and enrichment analyses were performed between GC and normal tissue. The LASSO-Cox proportional hazard regression model was applied to select prognostic genes and to construct a gene expression profile.ResultsOur research indicated that higher expression level of AKR1B1, PLD1, and UGT8 were correlated with worse prognosis of GC patients, while AGPAT3 was correlated with better prognosis. Furthermore, we developed a gene profile composed of AGPAT3, AKR1B1, PLD1, and UGT8 suggested three groups with a significant difference in overall survival (OS). The profile was successfully validated in an independent cohort and performed well in the immunohistochemical cohort. Furthermore, we found that ether lipid metabolism, glycerophospholipid metabolism, and glycerolipid metabolism were upregulated, and fatty acid β-oxidation and other lipid peroxidation processes were reduced in GC.ConclusionCollectively, we found lipid metabolism is reliable and clinically applicable in predicting the prognosis of GC based on a novel gene profile.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yu Chen ◽  
Hao Lin ◽  
Ya-Nan Pi ◽  
Xi-Xi Chen ◽  
Hu Zhou ◽  
...  

BackgroundCervical cancer is one of the most common types of gynecological malignancies worldwide. This study aims to develop an immune signature to predict survival in cervical cancer.MethodThe gene expression data of 296 patients with cervical cancer from The Cancer Genome Atlas database (TCGA) and immune-related genes from the Immunology Database and Analysis Portal (ImmPort) database were included in this study. The immune signature was developed based on prognostic genes. The validation dataset was downloaded from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database.ResultThe immune signature namely immune-based prognostic score (IPRS) was developed with 229 genes. Multivariate analysis revealed that the IPRS was an independent prognostic factor for overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) in patients with cervical cancer. Patients were stratified into high IPRS and low IPRS groups, and those in the high IPRS group were associated with better survival, which was validated in the validation set. A nomogram with IPRS and stage was constructed to predict mortality in cervical cancer.ConclusionsWe developed a robust prognostic signature IPRS that could be used to predict patients’ survival outcome.


Genes ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (6) ◽  
pp. 854
Author(s):  
Yishu Wang ◽  
Lingyun Xu ◽  
Dongmei Ai

DNA methylation is an important regulator of gene expression that can influence tumor heterogeneity and shows weak and varying expression levels among different genes. Gastric cancer (GC) is a highly heterogeneous cancer of the digestive system with a high mortality rate worldwide. The heterogeneous subtypes of GC lead to different prognoses. In this study, we explored the relationships between DNA methylation and gene expression levels by introducing a sparse low-rank regression model based on a GC dataset with 375 tumor samples and 32 normal samples from The Cancer Genome Atlas database. Differences in the DNA methylation levels and sites were found to be associated with differences in the expressed genes related to GC development. Overall, 29 methylation-driven genes were found to be related to the GC subtypes, and in the prognostic model, we explored five prognoses related to the methylation sites. Finally, based on a low-rank matrix, seven subgroups were identified with different methylation statuses. These specific classifications based on DNA methylation levels may help to account for heterogeneity and aid in personalized treatments.


2021 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Wanting Song ◽  
Yi Bai ◽  
Jialin Zhu ◽  
Fanxin Zeng ◽  
Chunmeng Yang ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Gastric cancer (GC) represents a major malignancy and is the third deathliest cancer globally. Several lines of evidence indicate that the epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) has a critical function in the development of gastric cancer. Although plentiful molecular biomarkers have been identified, a precise risk model is still necessary to help doctors determine patient prognosis in GC. Methods Gene expression data and clinical information for GC were acquired from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database and 200 EMT-related genes (ERGs) from the Molecular Signatures Database (MSigDB). Then, ERGs correlated with patient prognosis in GC were assessed by univariable and multivariable Cox regression analyses. Next, a risk score formula was established for evaluating patient outcome in GC and validated by survival and ROC curves. In addition, Kaplan-Meier curves were generated to assess the associations of the clinicopathological data with prognosis. And a cohort from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database was used for validation. Results Six EMT-related genes, including CDH6, COL5A2, ITGAV, MATN3, PLOD2, and POSTN, were identified. Based on the risk model, GC patients were assigned to the high- and low-risk groups. The results revealed that the model had good performance in predicting patient prognosis in GC. Conclusions We constructed a prognosis risk model for GC. Then, we verified the performance of the model, which may help doctors predict patient prognosis.


Cancers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 158
Author(s):  
Valentina Condelli ◽  
Giovanni Calice ◽  
Alessandra Cassano ◽  
Michele Basso ◽  
Maria Grazia Rodriquenz ◽  
...  

Epigenetics is involved in tumor progression and drug resistance in human colorectal carcinoma (CRC). This study addressed the hypothesis that the DNA methylation profiling may predict the clinical behavior of metastatic CRCs (mCRCs). The global methylation profile of two human mCRC subgroups with significantly different outcome was analyzed and compared with gene expression and methylation data from The Cancer Genome Atlas COlon ADenocarcinoma (TCGA COAD) and the NCBI GENE expression Omnibus repository (GEO) GSE48684 mCRCs datasets to identify a prognostic signature of functionally methylated genes. A novel epigenetic signature of eight hypermethylated genes was characterized that was able to identify mCRCs with poor prognosis, which had a CpG-island methylator phenotype (CIMP)-high and microsatellite instability (MSI)-like phenotype. Interestingly, methylation events were enriched in genes located on the q-arm of chromosomes 13 and 20, two chromosomal regions with gain/loss alterations associated with adenoma-to-carcinoma progression. Finally, the expression of the eight-genes signature and MSI-enriching genes was confirmed in oxaliplatin- and irinotecan-resistant CRC cell lines. These data reveal that the hypermethylation of specific genes may provide prognostic information that is able to identify a subgroup of mCRCs with poor prognosis.


2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Guoliang Jia ◽  
Zheyu Song ◽  
Zhonghang Xu ◽  
Youmao Tao ◽  
Yuanyu Wu ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Bioinformatics was used to analyze the skin cutaneous melanoma (SKCM) gene expression profile to provide a theoretical basis for further studying the mechanism underlying metastatic SKCM and the clinical prognosis. Methods We downloaded the gene expression profiles of 358 metastatic and 102 primary (nonmetastatic) CM samples from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database as a training dataset and the GSE65904 dataset from the National Center for Biotechnology Information database as a validation dataset. Differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were screened using the limma package of R3.4.1, and prognosis-related feature DEGs were screened using Logit regression (LR) and survival analyses. We also used the STRING online database, Cytoscape software, and Database for Annotation, Visualization and Integrated Discovery software for protein–protein interaction network, Gene Ontology, and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway analyses based on the screened DEGs. Results Of the 876 DEGs selected, 11 (ZNF750, NLRP6, TGM3, KRTDAP, CAMSAP3, KRT6C, CALML5, SPRR2E, CD3G, RTP5, and FAM83C) were screened using LR analysis. The survival prognosis of nonmetastatic group was better compared to the metastatic group between the TCGA training and validation datasets. The 11 DEGs were involved in 9 KEGG signaling pathways, and of these 11 DEGs, CALML5 was a feature DEG involved in the melanogenesis pathway, 12 targets of which were collected. Conclusion The feature DEGs screened, such as CALML5, are related to the prognosis of metastatic CM according to LR. Our results provide new ideas for exploring the molecular mechanism underlying CM metastasis and finding new diagnostic prognostic markers.


BMC Cancer ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiaodong Yang ◽  
Yuexin Zheng ◽  
Zhihai Han ◽  
Xiliang Zhang

Abstract Background As a marker of differentiation, Killer cell lectin like receptor G1 (KLRG1) plays an inhibitory role in human NK cells and T cells. However, its clinical role remains inexplicit. This work intended to investigate the predictive ability of KLRG1 on the efficacy of immune-checkpoint inhibitor in the treatment of lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD), as well as contribute to the possible molecular mechanisms of KLRG1 on LUAD development. Methods Using data from the Gene Expression Omnibus, the Cancer Genome Atlas and the Genotype-Tissue Expression, we compared the expression of KLRG1 and its related genes Bruton tyrosine kinase (BTK), C-C motif chemokine receptor 2 (CCR2), Scm polycomb group protein like 4 (SCML4) in LUAD and normal lung tissues. We also established stable LUAD cell lines with KLRG1 gene knockdown and investigated the effect of KLRG1 knockdown on tumor cell proliferation. We further studied the prognostic value of the four factors in terms of overall survival (OS) in LUAD. Using data from the Gene Expression Omnibus, we further investigated the expression of KLRG1 in the patients with different responses after immunotherapy. Results The expression of KLRG1, BTK, CCR2 and SCML4 was significantly downregulated in LUAD tissues compared to normal controls. Knockdown of KLRG1 promoted the proliferation of A549 and H1299 tumor cells. And low expression of these four factors was associated with unfavorable overall survival in patients with LUAD. Furthermore, low expression of KLRG1 also correlated with poor responses to immunotherapy in LUAD patients. Conclusion Based on these findings, we inferred that KLRG1 had significant correlation with immunotherapy response. Meanwhile, KLRG1, BTK, CCR2 and SCML4 might serve as valuable prognostic biomarkers in LUAD.


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