Identification of cullin family members as novel diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers in kidney renal clear cell carcinoma

Abstract

Kidney renal clear cell carcinoma (KIRC) is a prevalent histological subtype of kidney cancer and one of the most invasive urinary tumors. Members of the cullin family play a pivotal role in driving the development and progression of neoplasms. Accumulating evidence suggests that cullins might play a significant part in the initiation and advancement of KIRC. In this study, the messenger ribonucleic acid expression profiles for eight members of the cullin family (CUL1 - 9) were noticeably upregulated in KIRC compared to normal tissue, whereas CUL3, CUL5, and CUL7 were downregulated. Moreover, our analysis demonstrated that higher expression levels of CUL1 - 3, CUL4A, CUL4B, CUL5, and CUL7 were significantly correlated with enhanced overall survival (OS) in KIRC patients. Co-expression gene analysis showed that the differential expression of cullins in KIRC was predominantly associated with 20 genes. Functional enrichment analysis indicated that cullins in KIRC primarily participated in ubiquitin-mediated protein degradation, facilitated protein polyubiquitylation, and regulated APC/C activators during the G1/S phase transition and early anaphase. Furthermore, cullin gene expression exhibited a positive correlation with the activity of tumor-infiltrating immune cells. These findings suggest that cullins may serve as diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers in KIRC patients.

Keywords

Kidney renal clear cell carcinoma / Cullin gene family / Bioinformatics analysis / Prognostic value

Acknowledgments

None.

Funding

This work was supported by grants from the Henan Province Science and Technology Research Projects (Grant no.: 232102310208), Kaifeng City Science and Technology Research Projects (Grant no.: 2303009 and 2303011), and the Bioinformatics Center of Henan University (Grant no.: 2020YLXKJC02).

Conflict of interest

Shaoping Ji is an Associate Editor of this journal, but was not in any way involved in the editorial and peer-review process conducted for this paper, directly or indirectly. Separately, other authors declared that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have influenced the work reported in this paper.

Author contributions

Conceptualization: Shaoping Ji, Na Fang

Formal analysis: Shaohao Liu

Investigation: Shaohao Liu, Yange Wang, Dandan Wang

Methodology: Shaohao Liu, Yange Wang, Dandan Wang

Writing - original draft: Shaohao Liu, Yange Wang, Dandan Wang

Writing - review & editing: Shaohao Liu, Fei Wang

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Not applicable.

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Availability of data

Data are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

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