Identification of Epithelial-Mesenchymal Transition-Related lncRNAs that Associated With the Prognosis and Immune Microenvironment in Colorectal Cancer.

Chuan Liu,Liqing Jiang,Chengliang Zhao,Jianyi Li,Chuan Hu

doi:10.3389/fmolb.2021.633951

Abstract

Background: The expression of long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) is associated with the epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) in tumorigenicity, but the role of EMT-related lncRNA in colorectal cancer (CRC) remains unclear. Methods: The clinical data and gene expression profile of CRC patients were obtained from The Cancer Genome Atlas database. Differential expression analysis, Cox regression model, and Kaplan-Meier analysis were used to study the relationship between EMT-related lncRNAs and the prognosis of CRC. Functional analysis and unsupervised clustering analysis were performed to explore the influence of certain lncRNAs on CRC. Finally, Cytoscape was used to construct mRNA-lncRNA networks. Results: Two signatures incorporating six and ten EMT-related lncRNAs were constructed for predicting the overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS), respectively. Kaplan-Meier survival curves indicated that patients in the high-risk group had a poorer prognosis than those in the low-risk group. The results of the functional analysis suggested that the P53 and ECM-receptor pathways affect the prognosis of CRC, and AL591178.1 is a key prognostic EMT-related lncRNA, which is negatively related to immune cells, P53 pathway, and ECM-receptor pathway. Conclusion: Six OS-related and ten DFS-related EMT-related lncRNAs were correlated with the prognosis of CRC by potentially affecting the immune microenvironment, and AL591178.1 plays a key role as a prognostic factor.

Highlights

Epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) is a dynamic and reversible process that occurs in embryogenesis, organ development, wound healing, and fibrosis (Hay, 2005; Kalluri and Weinberg, 2009; Zeisberg and Neilson, 2009)
The volcano map showed that the majority of EMT-related long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) were upregulated in tumor tissues, indicating that these lncRNAs contribute to the tumorigenesis of colorectal cancer (CRC) (Figure 1B)
In order to find out the biomarker for CRC more accurately, we focused on three EMT-related lncRNAs that were simultaneously incorporated into overall survival (OS) and diseasefree survival (DFS) signatures, including MMP25-AS1, AL591178.1, and LINC01503

Summary

Introduction

Epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) is a dynamic and reversible process that occurs in embryogenesis, organ development, wound healing, and fibrosis (Hay, 2005; Kalluri and Weinberg, 2009; Zeisberg and Neilson, 2009). It is characterized by the interaction between polarized epithelial cells and the basement membrane. There is evidence that the dysregulation of EMT plays an important role in the occurrence and progression of cancers, especially in the process of invasion, metastasis, and resistance of antineoplastic drug (Montemayor-Garcia et al, 2013; Zhao et al, 2013; Nieto et al, 2016). The expression of long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) is associated with the epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) in tumorigenicity, but the role of EMT-related lncRNA in colorectal cancer (CRC) remains unclear

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion