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. 2024 Aug 30;14(1):20157.
doi: 10.1038/s41598-024-71191-y.

Baseline SUVmax is correlated with tumor hypoxia and patient outcomes in nasopharyngeal carcinoma

Affiliations

Baseline SUVmax is correlated with tumor hypoxia and patient outcomes in nasopharyngeal carcinoma

Jianming Ding et al. Sci Rep. .

Abstract

To evaluate the prognostic significance of the maximum standardized uptake value (SUVmax) in nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC), establish a gene signature that correlates with SUVmax, and explore the underlying biological behaviors associated with these correlations for the prediction of clinical outcomes. A cohort of 726 patients with NPC was examined to identify correlations between SUVmax and various clinical variables. RNA sequencing was performed to identify genes related to SUVmax, and these genes were used to develop an SUV signature. Additionally, transcriptome enrichment analysis was conducted to investigate the potential biological behaviors underlying the observed correlations. Higher SUVmax was associated with an increased tumor burden and worse prognosis. The SUV signature, which consisted of 10 genes, was positively correlated with SUVmax, and it predicted worse survival outcomes. This signature was highly expressed in malignant epithelial cells and associated with hypoxia and resistance to radiotherapy. Additionally, the signature was negatively correlated with immune function. SUVmax is a valuable prognostic indicator in NPC, with higher values predicting worse outcomes. The SUV signature offers further prognostic insights, linking glucose metabolism to tumor aggressiveness, treatment resistance, and immune function, and it could represent a potential biomarker for NPC.

Keywords: Glucose metabolism gene; Hypoxia; Nasopharyngeal carcinoma; Patient prognosis; SUVmax.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Associations of SUVmax with clinical variables in NPC. (A and B) Boxplots illustrate the distribution of SUVmax across different T and N stages in patients with NPC. (C and D) Scatter plots demonstrate the correlation of SUVmax with key parameters such as MTV and LDH levels. (EH) The figure presents survival curves for LRFS, DMFS, PFS, and OS.
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Construction of the SUV signature. (A) Heatmap depicting differential gene expression between the high and low SUVmax groups using the R package “pheatmap” version 1.0.12. (B and C) KEGG enrichment analysis and GSEA conducted on the differentially expressed genes within the high and low SUVmax groups. (D, E) Genes selected through LASSO regression and logistic analysis. (F) Contribution of the selected genes in constructing the SUV signature along with their corresponding regression coefficients.
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
SUV signature predicts SUVmax and prognosis. (A, B) Association between the SUV signature and SUVmax in our 16-patient cohort and GSE135565. (C) Prognostic prediction using the SUV signature in GSE102349. (D) UMAP plot visualizing the clusters of each cell type in NPC. (E) Violin plot depicting the SUV signature score in each cell type. (F, G) UMAP plot illustrating the SUV signature in epithelial cells. (H, I) Density and violin plot presenting the SUV signature score in malignant epithelial cells and normal epithelial cells.
Fig. 4
Fig. 4
Associations of the SUV signature with hypoxia and radiotherapy resistance. (A, D) Scatter plots illustrating the relationship between the SUV signature and hypoxic score in our center data and GSE102349. (B, C, E, and F) GSEA conducted using our center data and GSE102349.
Fig. 5
Fig. 5
Relationship between the SUV signature and immune function. (AD) Violin plots depict the expression of HAVCR2, PDCD1, LAG3, and TIGIT in T cells with high and low SUV signature scores. (EH) The correlations of the SUV signature with the immune score, the stromal score, the predictive score, and tumor purity.

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