AUTHOR=Wei Ran , Li Shuofeng , Yu Guanhua , Guan Xu , Liu Hengchang , Quan Jichuan , Jiang Zheng , Wang Xishan
TITLE=Deciphering the Pyroptosis-Related Prognostic Signature and Immune Cell Infiltration Characteristics of Colon Cancer
JOURNAL=Frontiers in Genetics
VOLUME=Volume 12 - 2021
YEAR=2021
URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/genetics/articles/10.3389/fgene.2021.755384
DOI=10.3389/fgene.2021.755384
ISSN=1664-8021
ABSTRACT=Background: Colon cancer (CC) remains one of the most common malignancies with a poor prognosis. Pyroptosis, referred to as cellular inflammatory necrosis, is thought to influence tumor development. However, the potential effects of pyroptosis-related regulators (PRRs) on the CC immune microenvironment remain unknown.
Methods: In this study, 27 PRRs reported in the previous study were used to cluster the 1,334 CC samples into three pyroptosis-related molecular patterns. Through subtype pattern differential analysis and structure network mining using Weighted Gene Co-expression Network Analysis (WGCNA), 854 signature genes associated with the PRRs were discovered. Further LASSO-penalized Cox regression of these genes established an eight-gene assessment model for predicting prognosis.
Results: The CC patients were subtyped based on three distinct pyroptosis-related molecular patterns. These pyroptosis-related patterns were correlated with different clinical outcomes and immune cell infiltration characteristics in the tumor microenvironment. The pyroptosis-related eight-signature model was established and used to assess the prognosis of CC patients with medium-to-high accuracy by employing the risk scores, which was named “PRM-scores.” Greater inflammatory cell infiltration was observed in tumors with low PRM-scores, indicating a potential benefit of immunotherapy in these patients.
Conclusions: This study suggests that PRRs have a significant effect on the tumor immune microenvironment and tumor development. Evaluating the pyroptosis-related patterns and related models will promote our understanding of immune cell infiltration characteristics in the tumor microenvironment and provide a theoretical basis for future research targeting pyroptosis in cancer.