IMR Press / CEOG / Volume 48 / Issue 6 / DOI: 10.31083/j.ceog4806219
Open Access Original Research
Integrated bioinformatical analysis of lncRNA-mRNA co-expression profiles of cervical cancer
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1 Department of Pharmacy, Obstetrics and Gynecology Hospital of Fudan University, 200011 Shanghai, China
2 Integrative Gynecology Department of Chinese and Western Medicine, Obstetrics and Gynecology Hospital of Fudan University, 200011 Shanghai, China
*Correspondence: 1817@fckyy.org.cn (Jing Tang)
These authors contributed equally.
Clin. Exp. Obstet. Gynecol. 2021, 48(6), 1381–1392; https://doi.org/10.31083/j.ceog4806219
Submitted: 3 June 2021 | Revised: 16 August 2021 | Accepted: 26 August 2021 | Published: 15 December 2021
Copyright: © 2021 The Author(s). Published by IMR Press.
This is an open access article under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
Abstract

Background: Aberrant gene expression, including protein-coding and non-coding genes (like long non-coding RNA, lncRNA), is associated with cervical cancer development. To reveal the possible molecular mechanisms of cervical carcinogenesis, this study conducted high throughput sequencing along with a bioinformatics analysis. Methods: The differentially expressed lncRNAs and mRNAs were assessed using a microarray technique in three pairs of cervical cancer and paracancerous tissues and analyzed using the Gene Ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway annotations. Their co-expression profiles, containing 653 nodes and 400 edges, were constructed and analyzed using Pearson’s correlation and lncRNA-mRNA co-expression network analyses. Results: There were 242 lncRNAs and 169 mRNAs upregulated and 1204 lncRNAs and 1131 mRNAs downregulated in cervical cancer (fold change 2 or –2; p 0.05). The KEGG pathway analytic data showed that these differentially expressed mRNAs were primarily enriched in the ubiquitin-mediated proteolysis and cancer pathways. The differentially expressed cis-targeted lncRNAs were associated with the TGF-β signaling and cell adhesion molecules, while the trans-targeted lncRNAs were related to p53 signaling. Functional analysis of the integrated mRNA-lncRNA co-expression networks were linked to autophagy, regulation of vascular genesis, transcriptional repressor complex, and regulation of gene expression. Conclusions: These differentially expressed lncRNAs and mRNAs could be associated with cervical cancer development and/or progression.

Keywords
Cervical cancer
Long non-coding RNA
Microarray
Pathway analysis
Co-expression network
Funding
#AB83110002017005/Shanghai Key Specialty Project of Clinical Pharmacy
#19401900900/Science and Technology Support Planning of Shanghai Science and Technology Commission
Figures
Fig. 1.
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