Clinicopathological analysis of HOXD4 expression in diffuse gliomas and its correlation with mutations and 1p/19q co-deletion.

Backgrounds: HOX (homologous box) is known as the dominant gene of vertebrate growth and cell differentiation. Abnormal expression of HOX gene in various tumors has attracted the attention of scholars. As a component of HOX clusters, HOXD4 plays a controversial role in the tumorigenesis of central nervous system.

Results: The data demonstrated that and the results demonstrated that HOXD4 was overexpressed in glioma tissues compared to that of normal brain tissues. patients with high HOXD4 expression had a significant shorter survival than those with low HOXD4 expression in total glioma cohort (<0.001), WHO Grade II cohort (=0.003) and Grade III cohort (<0.001), but not in Grade IV cohort when OS (overall survival) was analyzed (=0.216). The findings were confirmed by the large-scale omics data analysis including lower-grade glioma (LGG) and glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) in TCGA (the cancer genome atlas) and CGGA (Chinese glioma genome atlas). Moreover, it was revealed that the expression of HOXD4 have a significant impact on the OS of Grade IV glioma with wild-type and 1p/19q intact according to TCGA data.

Methods: Clinicopathological analysis of HOXD4 expression in 453 glioma patients was performed in the current study. Expression of HOXD4 was evaluated by qPCR and immunohistochemical (IHC) staining. Univariate and multivariate analysis were conducted to investigate the prognostic role of HOXD4 in glioma patients.

Conclusions: Expression of HOXD4 was closely related to the clinical outcomes of patients with gliomas, and HOXD4 may be a potential prognostic biomarker of gliomas.