Signature based on immune-related LncRNA can predict overall survival of osteosarcoma patients

Abstract Background: Osteosarcoma is a malignant bone tumor common in children and adolescents. Metastatic status remains the most important guideline for classifying patients and making clinical decisions. Despite many efforts, newly diagnosed patients receive the same therapy that patients have received over the last 4 decades. With the development of high-throughput sequencing technology and the rise of immunotherapy, it is necessary to deeply explore the immune molecular mechanism of osteosarcoma. Methods: We obtained RNA-seq data and clinical information of osteosarcoma patients from TCGA database and TARGET database. With the help of co-expression analysis we identified immune-related lncRNA and then by means of univariate Cox regression analysis prognostic-related lncRNA was screened out. And also by using least absolute shrinkage and selection operator regression method a model based on immune-related lncRNA was constructed. The differences in overall survival, immune infiltration, immune checkpoint gene expression, and tumor microenvironmental immunity type between the two groups were evaluated. Results: We constructed a signature consisting of 13 lncRNA. Our results show that signatures can reliably predict the overall survival of patients with osteosarcoma and can bring net clinical benefits. Further more, the signatures can be used for further risk stratification of the metastasis patients. Patients in the low-risk group had higher immune cell infiltration and immune checkpoint gene expression. The results from gene set variation analysis show that patients in low-risk group are closely related to immune-related pathways when compared with patients in high-risk group. Finally, patients in the low-risk group are more likely to be classified as TMIT I and hence more likely to benefit from immunotherapy. Conclusion: Our signature may be a reliable marker for predicting the overall survival of patients with osteosarcoma. Keywords: Osteosarcoma, TCGA, LncRNA, Tumor immunology, Prognosis.