A pan-cancer analysis of anti-proliferative protein family genes for therapeutic targets in cancer

Abstract

The recently discovered APRO (anti-proliferative protein) family encodes a group of trans-membrane glycoproteins and includes 6 members: TOB1, TOB2, BTG1, BTG2, BTG3 and BTG4. The APRO family is reportedly associated with the initiation and progression of cancers. This study aims to undertake a comprehensive investigation of the APRO family of proteins as a prognostic biomarker in various human tumors. We performed a pan-cancer analysis of the APRO family based on The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA). With the bioinformatics methods, we explored the prognostic value of the APRO family and the correlation between APRO family expression and tumor mutation burden (TMB), microsatellite instability (MSI), drug sensitivity, and immunotherapy in numerous cancers. Our results show that the APRO family was primarily down-regulated in cancer samples. The expression of APRO family members was linked with patient prognosis. In addition, APRO family genes showed significant association with immune infiltrate subtypes, tumor microenvironment, and tumor cell stemness. Finally, our study also demonstrated the relationship between APRO family genes and drug sensitivity. This study provides comprehensive information to understand the APRO family’s role as an oncogene and predictor of survival in some tumor types.

A pangenome analysis of ESKAPE bacteriophages: the underrepresentation may impact machine learning models

“…The putative genes containing the keywords 'inhibit' or 'anti' show the potential for novel antimicrobial activities from the ESKAPE phages. For example, the 'anti-proliferative' gene only appears in the list of putative genes, and, interestingly, this gene may be involved in the regulation of cell growth and development (Kalie et al, 2007;Zhang et al, 2023). Subsequently, we analyzed the most frequent cooccurrence of functional proteins in the ESKAPE phage genomes (Figure 3).…”