Aberrant FAM64A mRNA expression is an independent predictor of poor survival in pancreatic cancer

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 14; no. 1; p. e0211291
• Main Authors: Jiao, Yan, Fu, Zhuo, Li, Yanqing, Zhang, Wei, Liu, Yahui
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 29.01.2019; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Alcohol; Bioinformatics; Biology and Life Sciences; Biomarkers; Biomarkers, Tumor - genetics; Cancer; Cancer genetics; Cancer research; Cancer therapies; Case-Control Studies; Cell cycle; Cell proliferation; Cell survival; Computational biology; Data mining; Data processing; Deoxyribonucleic acid; Diagnosis; Diagnostic systems; DNA; DNA repair; E2F protein; Early Detection of Cancer; Female; Gene expression; Gene Expression Profiling; Gene Expression Regulation, Neoplastic; Gene Regulatory Networks; Gene set enrichment analysis; Genes; Genetic aspects; Genomes; Genomics; Glucose metabolism; Glycolysis; Health risks; Humans; Intracellular Signaling Peptides and Proteins - genetics; Kaplan-Meier Estimate; Kinases; Localization; Male; Medical diagnosis; Medical imaging; Medical prognosis; Medicine and Health Sciences; Messenger RNA; Myc protein; NMR; Nuclear magnetic resonance; Nuclear Proteins - genetics; Pancreatic cancer; Pancreatic Neoplasms - diagnosis; Pancreatic Neoplasms - genetics; Patients; Phenotypes; Prognosis; Protein folding; Proteins; Research and Analysis Methods; Risk analysis; Risk factors; RNA; ROC Curve; Spindles; Surgery; Survival; Survival Analysis; Target recognition; Up-Regulation; Taiwan; China
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0211291

FAM64A, a marker of cell proliferation, has been investigated as a potential biomarker in several cancers. In the present study, we examined the value of FAM64A expression in the diagnosis and prognosis of pancreatic cancer through bioinformatics analysis of data obtained from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) database. The diagnostic value of FAM64A expression in pancreatic cancer tissue was deteremined through receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis, and based on the obtained cut-off value, patients were divided into two groups (high FAM64A expression and low FAM64A expression). Chi-square and Fisher exact tests were applied to identify associations between FAM64A expression and clinical features. Moreover, the effect of FAM64A expression in the survival of pancreatic cancer patients was observed by Kaplan-Meier and Cox analyses. Gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA) was performed using the TCGA dataset. Our results showed that high FAM64A expression in pancreatic cancer was associated with survival status, overall survival (OS), and recurrence. The area under the ROC curve was 0.736, which indicated modest diagnostic value. Patients with higher FAM64A expression had significantly shorter OS and recurrence-free survival (RFS) times. Multivariate survival analysis demonstrated that high FAM64A expression was an independent risk factor for OS and RFS. GSEA identified mitotic spindles, myc targets, MTORC1 signaling, G2M checkpoint, E2F targets, DNA repair, glycolysis and unfolded protein response as differentially enriched with the high FAM64A expression phenotype. In conclusion, high FAM64A mRNA expression is an independent risk factor for poor prognosis in pancreatic cancer.