Research Paper Volume 13, Issue 2 pp 2418—2435

Immune-related gene signature predicts overall survival of gastric cancer patients with varying microsatellite instability status

Ruyue Tian1,2, , Jiexuan Hu1, , Xiao Ma1, , Lei Liang2, , Shuilong Guo3, ,

  • 1 Department of Oncology, Beijing Friendship Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing 100050, China
  • 2 Department of Ultrasound, Aero Space Central Hospital, Beijing 100050, China
  • 3 Department of Gastroenterology, Beijing Friendship Hospital, Capital Medical University, National Clinical Research Center for Digestive Disease, Beijing Digestive Disease Center, Beijing Key Laboratory for Precancerous Lesion of Digestive Disease, Beijing 100050, China

Received: December 3, 2019       Accepted: November 10, 2020       Published: December 9, 2020      

https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.202271
How to Cite

Copyright: © 2021 Tian et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Abstract

Purpose: Gastric cancer (GC) is one of the most common and fatal malignancies globally. While microsatellite instability (MSI) index has earlier been correlated with survival outcome in gastric cancer patients, the present study aims to construct a risk-stratification model based on immune-related genes in GC patients with varying MSI status.

Results: The univariate and multivariate Cox regression analyses identified SEMA7A, NUDT6, SCGB3A1, NPR3, PTH1R, and SHC4 as signature genes, which were used to build the prognostic model for GC patients with microsatellite instability-low (MSI-L) and microsatellite stable (MSS). Whereas, for GC patients with microsatellite instability-high (MSI-H), prognostic model was established with three genes (SEMA6A, LTBP1, and BACH2), based on the univariate and multivariate Cox regression, and Kaplan-Meier survival analyses.

Conclusion: The prognostic immune-related gene signature identified in this study may offer new targets for personalized treatment and immunotherapy for GC patients with MSI-H or MSI-L/MSS status.

Methods: The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and ImmPort databases were used to extract expression data and to explore prognostic genes from the immune-related genes (IRGs), respectively. Univariate and multivariate Cox regression analysis were applied to identify IRGs correlated with patient prognosis. The regulatory network between prognostic IRGs and TFs were performed using R software.

Abbreviations

GC: Gastric cancer; MSI: microsatellite instability; MSI-H: microsatellite instability-high; MSI-L: microsatellite instability-low; MSS: microsatellite stable; IRGs: immune-related genes; TF: transcription factors; DEG: differentially-expressed genes; TCGA: The Cancer Genome Atlas; OS: overall survival.