Identification and validation of novel lung adenocarcinoma subtypes and construction of prognostic models: based on cuprotosis-related genes

Cuprotosis is a novel and unique form of cell death that is of great value in a variety of cancers. However, the prognostic role of cuprotosis-related genes (CRGs) in lung cancer remains undetermined. We compared the expression profile of CRGs in lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD) patients, revealing the genetic alterations and inter-gene correlations of CRGs. Based on 13 CRGs, LUAD patients could be well differentiated into two molecular subgroups, and the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in these molecular subtypes were identified. Furthermore, 10 cuprotosis pattern-related DEGs with a significant prognostic value were obtained for constructing a prognostic model. Through validation in an external validation set, the prognostic model based on the CRGs-risk score showed the robust and effective predictive ability and served as an independent prognostic indicator for LUAD patients. Therefore, combining the CRGs-risk score with multiple factors such as clinicopathological characteristics, a quantitative nomogram was developed to predict the survival and prognosis of LUAD patients, improving the clinical application value of the CRGs-risk score. In the low CRGs-risk score group, the related immune cell infiltration was increased and the immune function was activated in LUAD patients. This study may add to the knowledge of CRGs in LUAD, partly contribute to evaluating the prognosis of LUAD patients, and provide direction for the development of targeted therapy and immunotherapy.