Clinicopathological significance of 5'-3' exoribonuclease 2 expression in small cell lung cancer tissues

Small cell lung cancer (SCLC) is an aggressive neuroendocrine malignancy. Overall survival in SCLC patients remains poor, and there is a lack of treatment options after the failure of first-line therapy. 5'-3' exoribonuclease 2 (XRN2) is associated with tumor progression. However, its mechanism in SCLC remains unclear. In this study, we collected and analyzed the expression data for XRN2 mRNA in SCLC and non-cancer lung tissues, as well as pan-cancer and non-cancer tissues from high-throughput datasets and identified XRN2 expression was significantly correlated with the prognosis of SCLC patients. Gene Ontology analysis indicated that XRN2 may promote tumor cell growth and development through biological processes. XRN2 performed better at distinguishing between the control group and samples of many tumors. Based on the TIMER and ESTIMATE algorithm analyses, this study revealed that XRN2 may act as a stimulator of immune responses in many tumors.Together,XRN2 overexpression may be associated with SCLC cell proliferation, migration, and invasion. High XRN2 expression is related to poor prognosis in SCLC and several other cancer types. XRN2 may also stimulate immune responses in many tumors. • XRN2 mRNA and protein are upregulated in SCLC tissues. • High XRN2 expression predicts poor prognosis in SCLC patients. • XRN2 promotes SCLC progression via DNA repair and replication pathways. • XRN2 is overexpressed in 8 cancer types and linked to worse survival. • XRN2 may stimulate immune cell infiltration in multiple cancers.