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Research Paper|Volume 14, Issue 4|pp 1822—1835

Downregulated exosome-associated gene FGF9 as a novel diagnostic and prognostic target for ovarian cancer and its underlying roles in immune regulation

Zhijie Xu1,2,3, Yuan Cai1, Wei Liu4, Fanhua Kang2, Qingchun He5,6, Qianhui Hong2, Wenqin Zhang2, Jianbo Li2, Yuanliang Yan7, Jinwu Peng1,2
  • 1Department of Pathology, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha 410008, Hunan, China
  • 2Department of Pathology, Xiangya Changde Hospital, Changde 415000, Hunan, China
  • 3National Clinical Research Center for Geriatric Disorders, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha 410008, Hunan, China
  • 4Department of Orthopedic Surgery, The Second Hospital University of South China, Hengyang 421001, Hunan, China
  • 5Department of Emergency, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha 410008, Hunan, China
  • 6Department of Emergency, Xiangya Changde Hospital, Changde 415000, Hunan, China
  • 7Department of Pharmacy, Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha 410008, Hunan, China
* Equal contribution
Received: January 7, 2022Accepted: February 15, 2022Published: February 21, 2022
https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.203905

Copyright: © 2022 Xu 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

Exosome has been demonstrated to be secreted from cells and seized by targeted cells. Exosome could transmit signals and exert biological functions in cancer progression. Nevertheless, the underlying mechanisms of exosome in ovarian cancer (OC) have not been fully explored. In this study, we wanted to explore whether Fibroblast growth factor 9 (FGF9), as an exosome-associated gene, was importantly essential in OC progression and prognosis. Firstly, comprehensive bioinformatics platforms were applied to find that FGF9 expression was lower in OC tissues compared to normal ovarian tissues. Meanwhile, downregulated FGF9 displayed favorable prognostic values in OC patients. The gene enrichment of biological functions indicated that abnormally expressed FGF9 could be involved in the OC-related immune signatures, such as immunoinhibitors and chemokine receptors. Taken together, these findings could provide a novel insight into the significance of FGF9 in OC progress and supply a new destination of FGF9-related immunotherapy in clinical treatment.