Investigation of CDH3 as a Diagnostic and Prognostic Biomarker in Lung Adenocarcinoma: An Integrative Analysis of Gene Expression, Promoter Methylation, and Clinical Significance

Abstract

Background: LUAD constitutes the most prevalent type of lung cancer and one of the major causes of death due to malignancies worldwide. Identification of reliable molecular biomarkers will be crucial to improve diagnosis, prognosis and therapy for this disease. Objectives: This study will analyze the role of CDH3 gene expression in LUAD as a potentially useful diagnostic and prognostic biomarker using an integrated bioinformatic approach focusing on gene expression, promoter methylation, clinicopathological characteristics, survival outcomes and its correlation with MAP7D1. Methods: Datasets from publicly available transcriptomic and clinical databases will be employed for the analysis of CDH3 gene expression in different types of cancers and in LUAD in particular. Different expression analyses will compare CDH3 expression levels in tumor vs normal lung tissue samples, whereas subgroup analyses will investigate relationships with demographic and clinicopathological features. Analysis of promoter methylation will address any possible epigenetic regulation of CDH3 expression. Survival analyses will be performed to test the prognostic value of CDH3 expression levels. Finally, correlation analyses will explore the association between CDH3 and MAP7D1 gene expression in LUAD tumors. Results: Overexpression of CDH3 was found in LUAD in comparison with normal lung tissues. High CDH3 expression levels were associated with several clinicopathological and demographic features, including tumor stage, nodal metastasis, tumor subtype and TP53 mutation status. Analysis of promoter methylation pointed at a possible role of the epigenetic regulation of CDH3 in LUAD. Survival analysis highlighted a negative association between CDH3 expression levels and survival in LUAD patients, which was significantly different across gender, race and smoking status subgroups. Moreover, CDH3 expression in LUAD was positively correlated with MAP7D1 expression. Conclusion: The integrative analysis suggests that CDH3 is a good biomarker for diagnosis and prognosis of lung adenocarcinoma. The abnormal expression of CDH3, the connection with clinical features, the interaction with methylation of the promoter region and the correlation with MAP7D1 altogether highlight its potential importance. Further researches are needed to confirm CDH3 as a treatment target.