FAM3 family genes are associated with prognostic value of human cancer: a pan-cancer analysis

Background: Family with sequence similarity three member (FAM3) plays a crucial role in the malignant development of various cancers of human. Our study aimed to investigate the role of FAM3 family genes in prognosis, immune subtype, tumor immune microenvironment, stemness score, and anticancer drug sensitivity of pan-cancer. Methods: The expression, survival, immune subtype, tumor microenvironment, stemness score, and anticancer drug sensitivity analysis data of FAM3 family genes associated with pan-cancer from UCSC Xena GDC and CellMiner databases. Furthermore, we investigated the tumor cellular functions and clinical prognostic value FAMC3 in pancreatic cancer (PAAD) using cellular experiments and tissue microarray. Results: The results revealed that FAM3 family genes are significantly differential expression in tumor and adjacent normal tissues in 7 cancers (CHOL, HNSC, KICH, LUAD, LUSC, READ, and STAD). The expression of FAM3 family genes were negatively related with the RNAss, and robust correlated with immune type, tumor immune microenvironment and drug sensitivity. Meanwhile, overexpression FAM3C promoted PAAD cell proliferation, migration, invasion and suppressed PAAD cell apoptosis. While knockdown of FAM3C triggered opposite results. High FAM3C expression was associated with duodenal invasion, differentiation and liver metastasis. Conclusion: This study provided a new perspective on the potential therapeutic role of FAM3 family genes in pan-cancer. In particular, FAM3C may be a new marker for PAAD, providing a new idea for the treatment of PAAD.