Adamantinomatous craniopharyngioma (ACP) is a congenital epithelial tumor in the sellar region with benign histological manifestation but invasive. Currently, surgery is the main treatment for it, but its recurrence rate is high. Therefore, it is of great importance to explore the mechanism of occurrence and development of ACP and to identify new molecules. One gene expression profile, GSE94349, was downloaded from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database. The differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified by the limma package. Gene set enrichment analysis was used to make enrichment analysis using Gene Ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG). Then, we performed the construction and analysis of the protein-protein interaction (PPI) network and significant module. The analysis of the GSE94349 dataset identified 109 DEGs, consisting of 80 upregulated genes and 29 downregulated genes in ACP samples compared with normal brain tissues. Functional and pathway enrichment analysis of DEGs provided a comprehensive overview of some major pathophysiological mechanisms in ACP: RNA polymerase II promoter, glutamate receptor binding, and so on. A total of 10 hub genes of DEGs were obtained from the PPI network, which provided potential therapeutic targets for the ACP. In summary, there were DEGs between ACP tissues and normal brain tissues, which may be involved in the mechanisms of occurrence and development of ACP, especially via the regulation of RNA polymerase II promoter and glutamate receptor binding. Key genes in DEGs could serve as new research targets for the diagnosis and treatment of ACP.
Keywords: Gene Ontology; Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes; adamantinomatous craniopharyngioma; differentially expressed genes; protein–protein interaction.