Integrated bioinformatics analyses identifying key transcriptomes correlated with prognosis and immune infiltrations in lung squamous cell carcinoma.

BACKGROUND

Lung Squamous Cell Carcinoma (LUSC) is a major subtype of lung malignancies and is associated with the cause of cancer-mediated mortality worldwide. However, identification of transcriptomic signatures associated with survival-prognosis and immunity of tumor remains lacking.

METHOD

The GSE2088, GSE6044, GSE19188, GSE21933, GSE33479, GSE33532, and GSE74706 were integrated for identifying differentially expressed genes (DEGs) with combined effect sizes. Also, the TCGA LUSC cohort was used for further analysis. A series of bioinformatics methods were utilized for conducting the whole study.

RESULTS

The 831 genes (such as and ) were found upregulated and the 731 genes (such as and ) were downregulated in the LUSC. The functional enrichment analysis identifies the upregulated KEGG pathways, including cell cycle, DNA replication, base excision repair, proteasome, mismatch repair, and cellular senescence. Also, the key hub genes (such as and ) were identified along with the eight gene modules that were significantly related to the protein-protein interaction (PPI) The clinical analyses identified that the overexpression group of and are substantially associated with a poor survival prognosis and the downregulated group of showed a similar trend. Moreover, our investigation demonstrated that the survival-associated genes were correlated with the stromal and immune scores in LUSC, indicating that the survival-associated genes regulate tumor immunity. The survival-associated genes were genetically altered in 27% of LUSC patients and showed excellent diagnostic efficiency. Finally, the consistent expression level of and were found in the TCGA LUSC cohort.

CONCLUSIONS

The identification of key transcriptomic signatures can be elucidated by the crucial mechanism of LUSC carcinogenesis.