A Ferroptosis-Related Gene Signature for Predicting Survival and Immunotherapy Effect in Renal Cancer

BACKGROUND: Most recently, no efficient prognostic indictor is present for kidney cancer. Thus, we aimed to build and validate a new prognostic gene signature for renal cancer patients using the Cancer Genomic Atlas (TCGA). METHODS: A “time-dependent receiver operating characteristic (tROC)” curve was generated, and a log-rank test was performed to assess the performance of the biomarker in training and validation. A “ferroptosis-related gene signature” was developed. In different training and validations sets, tROC and log-rank test were used to validate the biomarker's performance. RESULTS: In the training set with a P value less than 0.01 and the validation set, the “gene signature” was significantly correlated with survival. Eventually, it was found that the ferroptosis-related gene signature was directly correlated with immune score and the score of tumor mutation, suggesting its role in predicting response to immunotherapy. CONCLUSION: We developed and validated a “ferroptosis-related gene signature” that can be sued for patients with kidney cancer. It can also assist in facilitating the plan for treatment and risk stratification.