Validation of the Functions and Prognostic Values of Synapse Associated Proteins in Lower-Grade Glioma

Abstract Background: Synapse and synapse associated proteins (SAPs) play critical roles in various neurodegeneration diseases and brain tumors. However, in lower-grade gliomas (LGG), SAPs have not been explored systematically. Herein, we are going to explore SAPs expression profile and its clinicopathological significance in LGG which can offer new insights to glioma therapy. Method: In this study, we used five sources including, Venkatesh, Shen, Colón, Jüttner R, Gene Ontology (GO) project to integrate a list of SAPs that covered 231 proteins with synaptogenesis activity and post synapse formation. The LGG RNA-seq data were downloaded from gene expression omnibus (GEO) database, The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), and Chinese Glioma Genome Atlas (CGGA). The differentially expressed SAPs were filtered out and constructed PPI to search for key modules and SAPs. Then, using Kaplan–Meier survival analysis, least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO), and multicox regression analysis, the prognostic significance of these key SAPs was evaluated. CGGA database, Human Protein Altas (HPA) and quantitative real-time PCR were used to verify our findings. Result: Data from function enrichment analysis revealed functions of differentially expressed SAPs in synapse organization and glutamatergic receptor pathway in LGGs. Survival analysis revealed four SAPs, GRIK2, GABRD, GRID2, ARC that were correlate with the prognosis of LGG patients and used to construct the prognostic models. Among them, the expression of GABRD was lower in glioma tissue than normal brain tissue, but higher in seizure LGG patients than non-seizure patients. The four-SAPs signature was revealed as an independent prognostic factor in gliomas.Conclusion: Our study presented a novel strategy to assess the prognostic risks of LGGs, based on the expression of SAPs. Also, we revealed that several SAPs upregulated in patients with seizures, indicating that they are linked to the pathogenesis of seizures in glioma patients.