Background/Aim: Upper-tract urothelial carcinomas (UTUCs) are highly aggressive malignancies with a poor prognosis, necessitating the development of new therapeutic targets and biomarkers. Paternally expressed gene 10 (PEG10) functions as a transcription factor and plays an important role in the development and progression of cancer. However, no studies have examined the role of PEG10 in UTUC. Patients and Methods: We retrospectively analyzed 103 patients with UTUC who underwent radical nephroureterectomy. We evaluated PEG10 expression using immunohistochemistry and performed in silico analyses using the UTUC public database. Results: Immunohistochemistry showed the PEG10 over-expression was associated with lower cancer-specific survival (p=0.018). In the UTUC public database, the high PEG10 expression group had a higher T-category (pp=0.016), and non-papillary tumors were more frequent in the high PEG10 expression group (p=0.015). The high PEG10 expression group was significantly correlated with lower disease-specific survival (p=0.004) and progression-free survival (pPEG10 expression group was observed in both TP53 and RB1 mutated types (p=0.002) and related to the neuroendocrine subtype (pPEG10 expression group is connected to epithelial-mesenchymal transition, G2M checkpoint, E2F targets, mitotic spindle, and myogenesis. Conclusion: Over-expression of PEG10 is associated with a poor prognosis in UTUC and may be linked to epithelial-mesenchymal transition. Furthermore, the over-expression of PEG10 may be related to the neuroendocrine subtype. PEG10 may be a biomarker of cancer progression in UTUC and represents a potential therapeutic target.
Okazaki et al. (Fri,) studied this question.