Sex-Biased Molecular Signature for Overall Survival of Liver Cancer Patients

Sun Young Kim; Hye Kyung Song; Suk Kyeong Lee; Sang Geon Kim; Hyun Goo Woo; Jieun Yang; Hyun-Jin Noh; You-Sun Kim; Aree Moon

doi:10.4062/biomolther.2020.157

Sex-Biased Molecular Signature for Overall Survival of Liver Cancer Patients

Biomol Ther (Seoul). 2020 Nov 1;28(6):491-502. doi: 10.4062/biomolther.2020.157.

Authors

Sun Young Kim¹, Hye Kyung Song¹, Suk Kyeong Lee², Sang Geon Kim³, Hyun Goo Woo^{4

5}, Jieun Yang^{4

5}, Hyun-Jin Noh^{5

6}, You-Sun Kim^{5

6}, Aree Moon⁷

Affiliations

¹ Department of Chemistry, College of Natural Sciences, Duksung Women's University, Seoul 01369, Republic of Korea.
² Department of Medical Life Sciences, Department of Biomedicine & Health Sciences, College of Medicine, The Catholic University of Korea, Seoul 06649, Republic of Korea.
³ College of Pharmacy and Integrated Research Institute for Drug Development, Dongguk University_Seoul, Goyang 10326, Republic of Korea.
⁴ Department of Physiology, Ajou University School of Medicine, Suwon 16499, Republic of Korea.
⁵ Department of Biomedical Science, Graduate School, Ajou University, Suwon 16499, Republic of Korea.
⁶ Department of Biochemistry, Ajou University School of Medicine, Suwon 16499, Republic of Korea.
⁷ Duksung Innovative Drug Center, College of Pharmacy, Duksung Women's University, Seoul 01369, Republic of Korea.

Abstract

Sex/gender disparity has been shown in the incidence and prognosis of many types of diseases, probably due to differences in genes, physiological conditions such as hormones, and lifestyle between the sexes. The mortality and survival rates of many cancers, especially liver cancer, differ between men and women. Due to the pronounced sex/gender disparity, considering sex/ gender may be necessary for the diagnosis and treatment of liver cancer. By analyzing research articles through a PubMed literature search, the present review identified 12 genes which showed practical relevance to cancer and sex disparities. Among the 12 sex-specific genes, 7 genes (BAP1, CTNNB1, FOXA1, GSTO1, GSTP1, IL6, and SRPK1) showed sex-biased function in liver cancer. Here we summarized previous findings of cancer molecular signature including our own analysis, and showed that sexbiased molecular signature CTNNB1^High, IL6^High, RHOA^High and GLIPR1^Low may serve as a female-specific index for prediction and evaluation of OS in liver cancer patients. This review suggests a potential implication of sex-biased molecular signature in liver cancer, providing a useful information on diagnosis and prediction of disease progression based on gender.

Keywords: Gene expression; Liver cancer; Molecular signature; Overall survival; Sex/gender.

Publication types

Review