A Six-LncRNA Expression Signature Associated with Prognosis of Colorectal Cancer Patients

Abstract

Background/aims: Colorectal cancer (CRC) is one of the most common malignant tumor with high migration and invasion capacity. Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) have been identified to influence multiple cancers progression through competitively binding microRNAs (miRNAs). In this study, we proposed to develop a lncRNA-based signature for CRC survival outcomes.

Methods: LncRNA expression profiles of CRC patients were extracted from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) data sets GSE38832 (training set) and GSE29621 (testing set) . Associations between lncRNA expression and CRC disease free survival (DFS) were evaluated through univariate Cox regression analysis, and prognosis signature constructed by combination of weighted lncRNA expression values were obtained through multivariate Cox regression analysis. Robustness of the prognosis signature was evaluated through receiver operating characteristics analysis in the testing set.

Results: A weighted prognosis signature of six lncRNAs, including LINC01583, LINC00276, LUNAR1, DKFZp434J0226, SFTA1P and OGFOD3, was yielded from multivariate Cox regression analysis. Samples with significantly different DFS dislayed distinct signatures, indicating considerable predictory accuracy of this expression signature.

Conclusion: Robustness of the prognosis signature was evaluated in the testing set through Kaplan-Meier and receiver operating characteristics (ROC) analysis. Furthermore, functional enrichment analysis of lncRNAs suggested significant enrichment of cancer related pathways. Our results revealed the promise of lncRNAs as prognostic biomarkers.

Keywords: Colorectal cancer; GEO; LncRNA; Prognosis.