Comprehensive analysis of the clinical significance and prospective molecular mechanisms of differentially expressed autophagy-related genes in thyroid cancer

Abstract

Thyroid cancer (TC) is the most common endocrine malignancy, accounting for approximately 90% of all malignancies of the endocrine system. Despite the fact that patients with TC tend to have good prognoses, the high incidence rate and lymph node metastases remain unresolved issues. Autophagy is an indispensable process that maintains intracellular homeostasis; however, the role of autophagy in several steps of the initiation and progression of TC has not yet been elucidated. In this study, we first identified several autophagy-related genes (ARGs) that were provoked in the onset of TC. Subsequently, a bioinformatics analysis hinted that these genes were markedly disturbed in several proliferative signaling pathways. Moreover, we demonstrated that the differentially expressed ARGs were closely related to several aggressive clinical manifestations, including an advanced tumor stage and lymph node metastasis. Our study further selected prognostic ARGs and developed a prognostic signature based on three key genes (ATG9B, BID and B1DNAJB1), which displayed a moderate ability to predict the prognosis of TC. On the whole, the findings of this study demonstrate that ARGs disrupt proliferation-related pathways and consequently lead to aggressive clinical manifestations. These findings provide insight into the potential molecular mechanisms of action of ARGs and their clinical significance, and also provide classification information of potential therapeutic significance.

The identification of autophagy‐related genes in the prognosis of oral squamous cell carcinoma

“…NKX2-3 encodes a homeodomain-containing transcription factor and is located on chromo- caspase-3 and upregulation of BH3 interacting-domain death agonist (Ahmed et al, 2019). In thyroid cancer, BID is upregulated and associated with the prognosis of thyroid cancer patients (Lin et al, 2018). BAK1 belongs to the BCL2 protein family and is located on chromosome 6p21.31.…”

A predicted risk score based on the expression of 16 autophagy‑related genes for multiple myeloma survival

“…org/package=survivalROC; version 1.0.3), which provides an effective approach for evaluating time-dependent ROC using censored data. To quantitatively evaluate the prognostic value, the area under the curve (AUC) of the ROC curves was calculated (24,(43)(44)(45)(46)(47)(48).…”

“…The aforementioned process is mediated by autophagy-related genes (ARGs). Autophagocytosis is a process in which cells use lysosomes to degrade damaged organelles and macromolecules under regulation of ARGs (19)(20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25)(26). Previous studies have identified 234 ARGs (27).…”

“…These ARGs have been identified as direct or indirect participants in the process of autophagy; thus, analysis of a list of ARGs can provide a comprehensive overview of the alterations of autophagy in multiple myeloma (MM). Several studies have demonstrated that these ARGs have significant clinical implications for various types of cancer, including glioma, liver cancer and thyroid cancer (23,24,28).…”

Development and validation of autophagy‐related‐gene biomarker and nomogram for predicting the survival of cutaneous melanoma

“…With the continuous emergence of new therapeutic targets, the current research focused on the discovery of prognostic biomarkers which associated any measurable diagnostic indicators used to evaluate the risk of disease . Clinically, prognostic biomarkers can be used to guide patient management, instruct individualized adjuvant treatment for high risk of patients at early stage, and prevent the development of potentially untreatable metastases . Recently, the research of Beclin1 and LC3‐II gives an indication of autophagy status in melanoma, but most studies only focused on a signal gene.…”