Background
This study sought to identify the key genes and molecular interactions related to ferroptosis in colorectal cancer (CRC) using machine-learning and bioinformatics analyses.
Methods
The Gene Expression Omnibus (National Institutes of Health, US) datasets for CRC were downloaded from the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) (
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/
). The 291 ferroptosis genes were downloaded and screened from the FerrDb (
http://www.zhounan.org/ferrdb
) and GeneCards (
https://www.genecards.org/
) databases. The least absolute shrinkage and selection operator regression model and support vector machine model were constructed to identify the different ferroptosis-related hub genes. The immune infiltrates were identified and a survival curve analysis was conducted.
Results
We identified 11 ferroptosis-related differentially expressed genes (DEGs) from the COADREAD (Colon and Rectal Cancer) dataset. We found that angiopoietin-related protein 7 (
ANGPTL7
) gene expression was positively correlated to both the neuroglobin (
NGB
) (r=0.678) and ceruloplasmin (CP) (r=0.454) genes but was negatively correlated with transferrin receptor 2 (
TFR2
) expression (r=–0.426). In addition,
TFR2
gene expression was positively correlated with the arachidonate lipoxygenase 3 (
ALOXE3
) (r=0.452) and carbonic anhydrase 9 (
CA9
) (r=0.411) genes. A total of 4 hub genes were identified by the machine-learning analysis [i.e., NADPH oxidase 4 (
NOX4
),
TFR2, ALOXE3
, and
CA9
]. The expression of the
NOX4
gene was significantly positively correlated with neutrophil (r=0.543) and M0 macrophage (r=0.422) infiltration. In addition, a positive correlation between
ALOXE3
and activated natural-killer cells (r=0.356) was found. Conversely, the
NOX4, TFR2
, and
CA9
genes were negatively correlated with the resting mast cells. A strong negative correlation was observed between
NOX4
and CD160 antigen (
CD160
) expression; however, a significant positive correlation was observed between
NOX4
and transforming growth factor beta receptor 1 (
TGFBR1
) expression (r=0.397). The patients had a more favorable prognosis when the
NOX4
expression levels were relatively low.
Conclusions
Our study identified 4 ferroptosis-related DEGs in CRC (i.e.,
NOX4, TFR2
,
ALOXE3
, and
CA9
), and fur...