Identification of the Dysregulated Pathways and Key Gene in Prostate Cancer by Transcriptome Analysis and Cell Biology Experiments

Abstract Background: Prostate cancer (PCa) is a common cancer in elderly men with the first increasing new cases and the second leading cause of cancer death, but the molecular mechanisms underlying the pathogenesis of prostate cancer remain unclear. Methods: Here we mainly used Weight gene co-expression network analysis (WGCNA), Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG), protein to protein interaction (PPI), gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA) and cell biology experiments to analyze prostate cancer data in GEO and The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) databases and revealed the main dysregulated pathways and key genes in prostate carcinogenesis. Results: We found that the focal adhesion pathway was the main pathway in PCa. FERMT2 was shown to be the key gene for prostate tumorigenesis both in GSE6919 and TCGA datasets. By using WGCNA and GSEA analysis, we found that FERMT2 was related to the focal adhesion pathway and the ECM interaction pathway. Cell biology experiments demonstrated that FERMT2 inhibited tumor cell proliferation and migration. Conclusion: Our findings revel that downregulation of FERMT2 and the focal adhesion pathway are the main characteristics of PCa and FERMT2 might be the potential biomarker or treatment target for PCa. Trial registration: The study is not a clinical trial.