Transcriptomic characteristics according to tumor size and SUV max in papillary thyroid cancer patients.

The SUV _max is a measure of FDG uptake and is related with tumor aggressiveness in thyroid cancer, however, its association with molecular pathways is unclear. Here, we investigated the relationship between SUV _max and gene expression profiles in 80 papillary thyroid cancer (PTC) patients. We conducted an analysis of DEGs and enriched pathways in relation to SUV _max and tumor size. SUV _max showed a positive correlation with tumor size and correlated with glucose metabolic process. The genes that indicate thyroid differentiation, such as SLC5A5 and TPO, were negatively correlated with SUV _max . Unsupervised analysis revealed that SUV _max positively correlated with DNA replication(r = 0.29, p = 0.009), pyrimidine metabolism(r = 0.50, p < 0.0001) and purine metabolism (r = 0.42, p = 0.0001). Based on subgroups analysis, we identified that PSG5, TFF3, SOX2, SL5A5, SLC5A7, HOXD10, FER1L6, and IFNA1 genes were found to be significantly associated with tumor aggressiveness. Both high SUV _max PTMC and macro-PTC are enriched in pathways of DNA replication and cell cycle, however, gene sets for purine metabolic pathways are enriched only in high SUV _max macro-PTC but not in high SUV _max PTMC. Our findings demonstrate the molecular characteristics of high SUV _max tumor and metabolism involved in tumor growth in differentiated thyroid cancer.
(© 2024. The Author(s).)