Bioinformatics Analysis Identifies a Novel Role of GINS1 Gene in Colorectal Cancer

Fanqin Bu; Xiaojian Zhu; Jinfeng Zhu; Zitao Liu; Ting Wu; Chen Luo; Kang Lin; Jun Huang

doi:10.2147/CMAR.S279165

Bioinformatics Analysis Identifies a Novel Role of GINS1 Gene in Colorectal Cancer

Cancer Manag Res. 2020 Nov 17:12:11677-11687. doi: 10.2147/CMAR.S279165. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Fanqin Bu^#^{1

2}, Xiaojian Zhu^#³, Jinfeng Zhu^#^{1

2}, Zitao Liu^{1

2}, Ting Wu⁴, Chen Luo^{1

2}, Kang Lin^{1

2}, Jun Huang¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Gastrointestinal Surgery, Second Affiliated Hospital of Nanchang University, Nanchang 330006, Jiangxi Province, People's Republic of China.
² Jiangxi Medical College of Nanchang University, Nanchang, People's Republic of China.
³ Research Center of The Seventh Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Shenzhen, People's Republic of China.
⁴ Department of Infectious Diseases of Guixi Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital, Yingtan, People's Republic of China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Background: Colorectal cancer (CRC) is one of the most lethal malignancies and the incidence of CRC has been on the rise. Herein, we aimed to identify effective biomarkers for early diagnosis and treatment of colorectal cancer via bioinformatic tools.

Methods: To identify differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in CRC, we downloaded CRC gene expression data from GSE24514 and GSE110223 datasets in Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) and employed R to analyze the data. We further performed functional enrichment analysis of the DEGs on the DAVID gene ontology analysis tool. STRING database and Cytoscape visualization tool were employed to construct a PPI (protein-protein interaction) network and establish intensive intervals in the network. Immunohistochemistry, qRT-PCR and Western blotting were performed to identify the expression level of GINS1 in CRC. In vitro and in vivo experiments were performed to assess the impact of GINS1 in the pathogenesis of CRC in terms of proliferation, migration and metastasis.

Results: Among the two datasets, 389 DEGs were identified and used to construct a PPI network. These genes were mainly involved in cell proliferation and cell cycle. Among them, 15 genes including GINS1 were found to be strongly associated with the PPI network. We further performed immunohistochemistry, qRT-PCR and Western blotting to identify that GINS1 expression was higher in CRC than in paired normal tissues. Moreover, in vitro and in vivo experiments demonstrated GINS1 could promote the proliferation, invasion and migration of colorectal cancer cells.

Conclusions: GINS1 could be considered as a potential biomarker for CRC patients.

Keywords: GINS1; bioinformatics screening; colorectal cancer.

Grants and funding

This work was supported by Jiangxi Key Research and Development Plan Project of Jun Huang (No. 20181BBG70019) and National Natural Science Foundation of Jun Huang (No. 82060445).