Endometriosis (EM), in which active endometrium is implanted in any site outside the uterine cavity, is a common gynecological disease characterized by chronic pelvic pain, dysmenorrhea, and infertility (Aghajanova and Giudice, 2010). Approximately 1% of all EM cases exhibit malignant transformation (Guo et al., 2012), which greatly reduces the quality of life of women at a childbearing age. Treatment of EM is challenging due to a high postoperative recurrence rate and the inhibitory effect of hormone drugs on ovarian function (Wu et al., 2017). Currently, surgical resection and hormone suppression represent the gold standard treatment for EM, although these are limited by high occurrence of side effects (Vercellini et al., 2013), recurrence rates, and treatment costs (Simoens et al., 2012). Therefore, identification of novel molecular factors, coupled with unraveling of the underlying mechanisms of EM will aid in development of effective treatment therapies.

Numerous hypotheses have been proposed to describe the underlying molecular mechanisms of EM, including the menstrual reflux theory (Kruitwagen et al., 1991), ectopic implantation, epigenetic as well as immune and inflammatory factors, immunodeficiency (Ahn et al., 2015), eutopic endometrium determinism, and stem cell factors (Burney and Giudice, 2012). To date, however, no single theory can explain all the causes of EM, although reflux and ectopic EM implantation represent the most commonly accepted theories. Notably, only a handful of women have EM (Hill et al., 2020). Advancement in molecular biology and pathophysiology technologies has revealed that pathogenesis of EM is closely associated with the body’s immune imbalance (Burney and Giudice, 2012). Previous studies have shown that cell-mediated and humoral immune changes contribute to disease progression in women with EM. Notably, functional changes in immune components, such as monocytes/macrophages, natural killer (NK) cells, T lymphocytes, B cells, and cytokines, in peritoneal fluid of women with EM have been described (Zou et al., 2021). Although numerous and brisk EMaICI, comprising several types of immune cells in all EM forms, have revealed acute immunological reactions within the microenvironment of EM lesions (Herington et al., 2011), the role of these changes in disease development remains unclear. Previous studies have demonstrated that overexpression and downregulation of antiapoptotic and proapoptotic factors, respectively, may interfere with peritoneal homeostasis (Erekat et al., 2018), while the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) signaling pathway has been shown to play a key role in disease occurrence (Lotfaliansaremi et al., 2020). Moreover, apoptosis pathways of Fas-FasL and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-a seem to play a key role in immune monitoring of the peritoneal microenvironment (Yamada et al., 2017). Overall, these changes may prevent clearance of endometrial cells that reach the peritoneal cavity, thereby allowing their implantation and development. The current consensus is that changes in immune-related cell function play a crucial role in occurrence and progression of EM (Ahn et al., 2015).

Although numerous studies have reported occurrence of immune abnormalities, the role of the immune system in EM is not fully understood, although some evidence has demonstrated that impaired immune homeostasis is associated with increased implantation, proliferation, and angiogenesis of ectopic endometrium (Holtan et al., 2009). Although EM is a benign disease, EM cells exhibit many characteristics similar to those observed in malignant tumors, including migration and aggressiveness. Therefore, exploring immune dysfunction in EM may help elucidate its role in pathogenesis of the disease and generate relevant insights to guide development of new treatment strategies. In addition, with the rapid development of high-throughput sequencing technologies, more and more potential biomarkers associated with EM were identified. Liu et al. (2015) found that the EGF, IL-β and AGTR1 play an important role in the pathogenesis of EM by using the microarray dataset. Cui et al. (2020) employed three microarray datasets, constructed a network, and revealed that YAP/TAZ was upregulated, and MOB1, pMOB1, SAV1, LATS1, and LATS2 were downregulated in endometrium. Dai et al. (2019) using four microarray datasets (GSE11691, GSE23339, GSE25628, and GSE78851) identified a number of differentially expressed genes (DEGs). However, these studies lack in-depth analysis and have no external validation dataset to evaluate their expression level. Therefore, a comprehensive analysis of the potential biomarkers based on a number of microarray datasets is in urgent demand.

In the present study, we downloaded five microarray datasets (GSE11691, GSE23339, GSE25628, GSE105764, and GSE7305) from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database to explore the potential biomarkers. We employed in-depth bioinformatics analysis to identify candidate genes and key signaling pathways regulating occurrence and progression of EM, as well as possible therapeutic drugs for its treatment. Overall, these findings provide new insights into the underlying molecular mechanisms and potential candidate drugs for treatment of EM.

In the present study, we identified DEGs across four datasets obtained from EM and normal tissues. These DEGs included 233 upregulated and 190 downregulated genes, respectively. GO and KEGG analyses revealed that these DEGs were involved in regulating immune-related signaling pathways, such as T-cell activation and regulation, as well as cell chemotaxis. Results from LASSO analysis revealed three key genes, namely, APLNR, CCL21, and FCGR2A. Among them, APLNR was firstly identified as a class A G protein-coupled receptor in 1993, which contained 380 amino acids. Ho et al. (2017) demonstrated that knocking out APLNR in pregnant mice resulted in PE-like symptoms due to defective placental angiogenesis, and this was accompanied by poor placental angiogenesis, elevated apoptosis, and decreased proliferation. Results from analysis of developmental model organisms have suggested that the Apelin/APJ pathway plays an important role in embryo angiogenesis (Kidoya et al., 2008). For example, dysregulated APLNR was associated with growth and migration, as well as cell cycle progression, in ovarian clear cell carcinoma (OCCC) cell lines (Xu and Shen, 2018). However, nothing is known regarding the role of APELA in EM.

C–C motif chemokine ligand 21, a homeostatic lymphoid chemokine that is widely expressed in fibroblasts, smooth muscles, as well as intravascular, T, and dendritic cells, plays an essential role in mediating activated DCs and T cells to lymph system niches and triggering subsequent immune response to foreign antigens (Lin et al., 2014). A previous study showed that poor differentiation was associated with larger tumor size in patients with CCL21-positive gallbladder cancer. Moreover, positive CBS and CCL21 expression are closely associated with clinical severity and poor prognosis in GBC, suggesting that it can be a marker for diagnosis of AC and SC/ASC type in GBC (Li et al., 2020). A CC chemokine receptor 7 (CCR7) and CCL21 are abundant in oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) tissues, where they regulate EMT process and promote OSCC desiccation through activation of the JAK2/STAT3 signaling pathway. CCR7 expression has been associated with poor prognosis of OSCC, while CCL21/CCR7 may be an effective target for prevention and treatment of the condition (Chen et al., 2020). Previous evidence has shown that CCL21 enhances GC progression via the MALAT1/SRSF1/mTOR axis, thereby providing a novel therapeutic target for the treatment of GC. Moreover, CCL21-mediated activation of the MALAT1/SRSF1/mTOR axis underpins the development of gastric carcinoma. In fact, Fu et al. (2021) found that CCL21 is significantly upregulated in the EM relative to normal tissues, which is consistent with our results.

The human FCGR2A gene contains at least 800 single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), located on chromosome 1q23.3 (Velissari et al., 2015). Under physiological conditions, activated FCGriia is constitutively expressed in platelets, neutrophils, macrophages, and dendritic cells, thereby providing an important link between cellular and humoral immunity through a cross-talk between IgG antibody–antigen complexes (Gillis et al., 2014). In fact, this phenomenon is well documented in a number of autoimmune diseases, including rheumatoid arthritis (Jiménez Morales et al., 2019), autoimmune thyroid disease (Mestiri et al., 2020), and idiopathic nephrotic syndrome in children (Rossi et al., 2017). Moreover, Lee et al. (2016) reported that FCGR2A (rs1801274) polymorphism was associated with better response to anti-TNF-a therapy in patients with spondyloarthropathy, psoriasis, and CD. Previous studies have also demonstrated that FCGR2A is the susceptibility gene for Kawasaki disease (KD), while levels in methylation of its CpG site promoter could act as a crucial biomarker for optimizing intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) therapy (Kuo et al., 2015). To date, however, the relationship between FCGR2A and EM remains unknown.

In addition, we also evaluated the landscape of 22 immune cells’ infiltration level of EM and normal samples. We found that the T follicular helper cells, gamma delta T cells, resting NK cells, activated NK cells, and M2 macrophages showed a significant divergence between normal and EM tissues. Previous studies have shown that healthy women and EM patients exhibit the largest population of immune cells in their peritoneal fluid. For example, a transcriptome analysis revealed 10,280 and 7,250 single-cell transcripts in the peritoneal fluid of EM and control samples, respectively (Zou et al., 2021). The cells in the peritoneal fluid play a role in immunity and are responsible for removing reflow menstrual debris as well as tissue defense. On the other hand, macrophages represent the largest immune population in the peritoneal fluid, followed by T and dendritic cells, which is consistent with previous studies (Guo et al., 2020). Pillarisetty et al. (2005) reported that other cell groups, including NK, mast, plasma, and epithelial cells, are an intermediate cell type, and named them NKDCs.

The macrophages, primary defense cells in the peritoneal cavity, mainly function to remove cell debris. Notably, EM cells in the peritoneal cavity are not targeted for clearance by phagocytes and NK cells; hence, they are able to escape and survive to invade the peritoneal cavity, via a mechanism called “immune escape” (Vetvicka et al., 2016). Vallvé-Juanico et al. (2019) demonstrated that the number and activation of macrophages are high in EM samples, and this was attributed to phagocytosis that clears red blood cells, damaged tissue fragments, and cell debris, and also produces soluble mediators, such as cytokines, prostaglandins, complement components, and enzymes, to regulate the peritoneal environment. Secretion of these immune mediators causes macrophages to induce inflammation, tissue repair, and neovascularization, a phenomenon that may contribute to recruitment of fibroblasts and endothelial cells (Yang et al., 2017). Previous studies have shown that macrophage-derived cytokines stimulate activation of other immune cells, such as T and B lymphocytes. Notably, numerous studies have demonstrated that macrophages are dysfunctional in EM despite an increase in their activation (Zou et al., 2021). Macrophages are functionally differentiated into M1 and M2 cell lines, in the presence of infectious microorganisms or host mediators (Thiruchelvam et al., 2012). Specifically, M1 macrophages are induced by expression of nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) and TNF to produce a large amount of nitric oxide, which is necessary for eliminating bacteria, viruses, and fungi infections. On the other hand, M2 macrophages, also called activated macrophages, respond to parasitic infection and tissue remodeling, and play an important role in angiogenesis and tumor progression. To date, the actual phenotypes of macrophages in the peritoneal fluid in EM patients remains controversial. Recent studies have shown that EM pathogenesis is a complex and heterogeneous phenomenon (Guo et al., 2020). In our analysis, we analyzed the level of 22 immune cells’ infiltration in EM using the CIBERSORTx algorithm and found that M2 macrophages were significantly elevated in EM, relative to normal tissues, indicating that the M2 macrophages might be involved in the pathogenesis of EM.

The NK cells are an important part of the innate immune system, where they play a crucial role in anti-tumor immunity. Some research evidence have shown that NK cytotoxicity increases in the peritoneal fluid of EM patients, with disease severity (Zou et al., 2021). Notably, these changes may interfere with the monitoring, recognition, and destruction of ectopic endometrium cells, thereby causing EM (Gogacz et al., 2017). In our result, we found that the level of resting NK cell and activated NK cell were significantly decreased from the healthy sample to the EM, which may increase the NK cytotoxicity level of EM.

Currently, a lack of non-invasive, clear, and consistent biomarkers for identification of EM have significantly affected accurate diagnosis of the disease. Notably, all pharmacological treatments for EM are inhibitory rather than radical, with non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) used as the drug of choice for management of EM-related pain (Wattier, 2018). To date, selective progesterone receptor modulators (SPRMs) (Song et al., 2018), oral contraceptives (Grandi et al., 2019), mifepristone (RU486) (Song et al., 2018), Levonorgestrel system (LNGN-ius) (Song et al., 2018), and aromatase inhibitors (Suardika and Pemayun, 2018) have been employed in treating EM. However, their role in restoring fertility and efficacies remains unsatisfactory due to numerous side effects. Here, we investigated the potential drugs through the CMAP dataset to the treatment of EM. We analyzed the mechanism of action of each drug and revealed 21 drugs, namely, W-13, phenazone, metixene, cinchonine, tetracycline, dihydroergocristine, quinpirole, lovastatin, memantine, metrizamide, naringenin, pentoxifylline, lobeline, zaprinast, chlortalidone, SC-560, oxybenzone, fasudil, fluoxetine, fludrocortisone, and vanoxerine, with the potential for treating EM.

This study had a few limitations. Firstly, although we identified and validated potential DEGs, we did not experimentally evaluate their efficacy. There is a need for multi-center prospective studies to evaluate their application. Secondly, we did not elucidate the underlying molecular mechanisms using in vivo and in vitro experiments. Finally, we did not obtain sufficient clinical information for the subjects herein; therefore, the clinical value of our findings needs further verification.

In conclusion, we identified three key genes between EM and healthy tissue, which may serve as potential biomarkers to the EM. We also evaluated the relationship between key genes and immune cell to explore the molecular mechanism of EM. Finally, we discovered molecular compounds that may contribute to the treatment of EM.

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/Supplementary Material, further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author/s.

YP conceived and designed the experiments and revised and wrote the manuscript. CP carried out the investigation and collected materials. ZF analyzed the data. GC provided administrative, technical, and material support and provided a critical review of the intellectual content of the manuscript. All authors contributed to the article and approved the submitted version.

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

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