Comprehensive analysis of the functional and prognostic value of E2F transcription factors in human prostate cancer through data mining and experimental validation

作者：Decai Wang, Wensen Tang, Pingbao Zhang, Zijian Liu, Fang Lyu, Yajun Xiao, Dong Ni, Pu Zhang · 发表于：Translational Cancer Research · 年份：2021 · DOI：10.21037/tcr-21-1532 · 被引用次数：17 · 研究领域：Cancer-related Molecular Pathways、Epigenetics and DNA Methylation、Ferroptosis and cancer prognosis

BACKGROUND: A growing body of evidence shows that E2F transcription factors play a significant role in the tumorigenesis of prostate cancer. However, their functional and prognostic value has not been fully illustrated. Therefore, we used bioinformatics methods to further analyze the possible roles of E2F transcription factors in the development and progression of prostate cancer. METHODS: We explored the expression levels of E2F transcription factors using data from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and Oncomine database in paired and unpaired samples. The clinical correlation and prognostic value of E2F transcription factors were assessed. Using the R package "pROC", we judged the diagnostic value of E2F transcription factors. The online website tool cBioPortal was also employed to find possible gene alterations of E2F transcription factors in samples from TCGA. The R package "clusterprofiler" was used to conduct functional analysis. Moreover, we also used the Tumor Immune Estimation Resource to search for the associations between E2F transcription factors and the infiltration levels of 6 kinds of immune cells. Finally, quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was conducted to validate the expression levels of E2F transcription factors in human paired prostate tissues. RESULTS: E2F1/2/3/5 messenger RNA (mRNA) expression levels were higher in prostate cancer tissues than in normal tissues, while E2F4 and E2F6 mRNA expression levels were lower (P<0.05). All E2F tra...