The four‑microRNA signature identified by bioinformatics analysis predicts the prognosis of nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients

Abstract

The aim of the present study was to identify microRNAs(miRNAs)thatpredicttheprognosisofpatientswith nasopharyngeal carcinoma by integrated bioinformatics analysis.First,theoriginalmicroarraydatasetGSE32960,including 312 nasopharyngeal carcinomas and 18 normal samples, was downloaded from the Gene Expression Omnibus database. In addition, 46 differentially expressed miRNAs (DEMs) were screened. Then, four miRNAs, including hsa-miR-142-3p, hsa-miR-150, hsa-miR-29b, and hsa-miR-29c, were obtained as prognostic markers by combining univariate Cox regression analysis with weighted gene coexpression network analysis (WGCNA). Subsequently, the risk score of 312 NPC patients from the signature of miRNAs was calculated, and patients were divided into high-risk or low-risk groups. Notably, compared with patients with low-risk scores, high-risk groups had shorter disease-free survival (DFS), overall survival (OS), and distant metastasis-free survival (DMFS). Receiver operating characteristic curve (ROC) analysis indicated that the