OVERALL SURVIVAL (OS) AND DISEASE-FREE SURVIVAL (DFS) RELATED CELL CYCLE GENES IN LUAD AND LUSC: A LARGE RETROSPECTIVE ANALYSIS BASED ON TCGA DATABASE.

OBJECTIVES Lung cancer is one of the deadliest cancers in the world. Two of the most common non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) subtypes are lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD) and lung squamous cell carcinoma (LUSC). The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), a landmark cancer genomics program, molecularly characterized over 20,000 the deadliest cancers in the primary cancers spanning 33 cancer types. We aim to analyze the association of 31 previously identified recurrence-related cell cycle genes on overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) in LUAD and LUSC, using TCGA database. METHODS We retrospectively analyzed the association between the expression of these 31 recurrence-related cell cycle genes and OS and DFS. Data included 740 patients from stage I to III by LUAD or LUSC. Results were reported as the hazard ratio (HR) related to a 1-unit increase in genes’ FPKM-UQ, based on sex- and age-adjusted robust Cox analysis stratified by clinical stage. Statistical significance was set at p < 0.05. RESULTS 740 patients were analyzed for OS, and 478 for DFS. For LUAD patients in stage I, the genes most associated with OS and DFS are DTL (HR=1.30, p=0.0083) and KIF20A (HR=1.34, p=0.0072), respectively. For LUAD stage II patients, the most impacted genes related with OS is PRC1 (HR=1.36, p=0.0033), whereas no gene was associated to DFS. For LUAD patients in stage III, the most impacted genes related with OS and DFS are PLK1 (HR=1.70, p=0.0000) and PTTG1 (HR=2.51, p=0.0230), respectively. For stage I, II and III LUSC patients, no gene was associated to OS and DFS (Figure 1). CONCLUSIONS We aim to highlight, through a large scale of patients, the most expressed and impacting genes on OS and DFS on LUAD and LUSC. This will be helpful to set further studies on prognostic genes profile in terms of recurrence and more tailoring therapies.