Prognostic value of immune scores in the microenvironment of colorectal cancer

Yuan,Wenliang; Cai,Wei; Huang,Xiao; Peng,Sihua

doi:10.3892/ol.2020.12119

Prognostic value of immune scores in the microenvironment of colorectal cancer

Authors:
- Wenliang Yuan
- Wei Cai
- Xiao Huang
- Sihua Peng
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Affiliations: Department of Data Science, College of Mathematics and Information Engineering, Jiaxing University, Jiaxing, Zhejiang 314001, P.R. China, Key Laboratory of Exploration and Utilization of Aquatic Genetic Resources (Shanghai Ocean University), Ministry of Education, Shanghai 200093, P.R. China, Department of Data Technology, College of Mathematics and Computer Science, Chizhou University, Chizhou, Anhui 247000, P.R. China
Published online on: September 18, 2020 https://doi.org/10.3892/ol.2020.12119
Article Number: 256
Copyright: © Yuan et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution License.

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Abstract

Cancer immunotherapy has become an important means of cancer treatment; however, the complex composition and heterogeneity of the colorectal cancer (CRC) microenvironment pose a huge challenge to cancer immunotherapy. Using data downloaded from The Cancer Genome Atlas database, the differences in the microenvironment between cases with low and high immune scores were examined at the multiomics level using bioinformatics approaches. It was revealed that the samples with high immune scores had good cytolytic immune responses and relatively abundant stromal cells, as well as significant infiltration of 22 immune cell subsets and a high non‑synonymous mutation burden and neoantigen burden. All of these characteristics contribute to a good prognosis. To better understand the impact of immune‑related genes on prognosis, differentially expressed genes between the low and high immune score samples were identified and it was concluded that serpin family Emember 1 (SERPINE1) and ubiquitin C‑terminal hydrolase L1 (UCHL1) may be potential therapeutic targets. The relationship between the immune score and the infiltration of 22 immune cells and the difference in SERPINE1 expression were verified by analyzing the GSE17536 and GSE21510 data sets downloaded from the Gene Expression Omnibus database.The present study analyzed the unique properties of immune cells in the CRC microenvironment, which are of great significance for understanding CRC immune mechanism and may also provide novel ideas for the targeted design of cancer immunotherapy.

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