Tumor-Infiltrating CD8+ T Cells Driven by the Immune Checkpoint-Associated Gene IDO1 Are Associated With Cervical Cancer Prognosis

Shun Zhang; Junhui Wan; Minjie Chen; Desheng Cai; Junlan Xu; Qi Chen

doi:10.3389/fonc.2021.720447

Tumor-Infiltrating CD8+ T Cells Driven by the Immune Checkpoint-Associated Gene IDO1 Are Associated With Cervical Cancer Prognosis

Front Oncol. 2021 Oct 27:11:720447. doi: 10.3389/fonc.2021.720447. eCollection 2021.

Authors

Shun Zhang¹, Junhui Wan², Minjie Chen³, Desheng Cai², Junlan Xu², Qi Chen⁴

Affiliations

¹ General Surgery Department, The First Affiliated Hospital of Nanchang University, Nanchang, China.
² Obstetrics and Gynaecology Department, The First Affiliated Hospital of Nanchang University, Nanchang, China.
³ Queen Mary College, Nanchang University, Nanchang, China.
⁴ Obstetrics and Gynecology Department, The First Affiliated Hospital of Nanchang University, Nanchang, China.

Abstract

Tumor-infiltrating immune cells, associated with tumor progression, are promising prognostic biomarkers. However, the relationship between levels of gene expression and that of immune cell infiltration in cervical cancer prognosis is unknown. In this study, three cervical cancer gene expression microarrays (GSE6791, GSE63678 and GSE55940) were obtained from the GEO database. The IDO1 gene was identified by differentially expressed gene screening. The gene expression profiles of TCGA and GTEx databases along with comprehensive bioinformatics analysis identified that the IDO1 gene was upregulated in cervical cancer with significant difference in expression at different N stages. In addition, it was also upregulated in HPV16 positive sample. The pan-cancer analysis identified that IDO1 was highly expressed in most cancers. TIMER analysis revealed that the expression of IDO1 in CESC shows positive correlation with CD8⁺ T cells, CD4⁺ T cells, neutrophils, dendritic cells. IDO1 expression showed remarkable positive correlation with all immune cell markers except M1 macrophages. CD8⁺ T cell infiltration GSEA results showed that IDO1 was mainly associated with tumor immune-related signaling pathways.

Keywords: cervical cancer; differentially expressed genes; immune infiltration; tumor immunity; tumor-infiltrating CD8+ T cells.