Identification of a TGF-β signaling-related gene signature for prediction of immunotherapy and targeted therapy for lung adenocarcinoma

BACKGROUND: Transforming growth factor (TGF)-β signaling functions importantly in regulating tumor microenvironment (TME). This study developed a prognostic gene signature based on TGF-β signaling-related genes for predicting clinical outcome of patients with lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD). METHODS: TGF-β signaling-related genes came from The Molecular Signature Database (MSigDB). LUAD prognosis-related genes were screened from all the genes involved in TGF-β signaling using least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) Cox regression analysis and then used to establish a risk score model for LUAD. ESTIMATE and CIBERSORT analyzed infiltration of immune cells in TME. Immunotherapy response was analyzed by the TIDE algorithm. RESULTS: A LUAD prognostic 5-gene signature was developed based on 54 TGF-β signaling-related genes. Prognosis of high-risk patients was significantly worse than low-risk patients. Both internal validation and external dataset validation confirmed a high precision of the risk model in predicting the clinical outcomes of LUAD patients. Multivariate Cox analysis demonstrated the model independence in OS prediction of LUAD. The risk model was significantly related to the infiltration of 9 kinds of immune cells, matrix, and immune components in TME. Low-risk patients tended to respond more actively to anti-PD-1 treatment, while high-risk patients were more sensitive to chemotherapy and targeted therapy. CONCLUSIONS: The 5-gene signature based on TGF-β signaling-related genes showed potential for LUAD management. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12957-022-02595-1.