Development of an antibody-dependent cellular phagocytosis (ADCP) gene signature to predict prognosis in hepatocellular carcinoma

Abstract It remains unclear whether ADCP-related genes are linked to the prognosis of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). We obtained RNA-seq data and relevant clinical information on HCC from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and the International Cancer Genome Consortium (ICGC) databases. We also obtained ADCP-related genes from a previous publication. We developed and validated a five-gene signature ( ELOVL1 , PRKCD , SORD , SPN , and CBFA2T3 ), which was dichotomized based on the median risk score. Patients in the high-risk group exhibited a significantly worse prognosis (p < 0.001). To account for other independent prognostic factors, such as the M stage and T stage, we constructed a nomogram that integrated clinical factors and risk scores. The nomogram demonstrated high predictive efficacies of 0.766, 0.784, and 0.797 (AUC) at 1, 3, and 5 years, respectively. Additionally, the low-risk group exhibited increased antitumor immune infiltrates, a higher immune score, and enrichment of antitumor immune pathways. Drug sensitivity analysis revealed that the low-risk group showed higher sensitivity to sorafenib (p < 0.001) and rapamycin (p < 0.0001) compared to the high-risk group. We identified a five-gene ADCP signature that was correlated with prognosis, immune microenvironment characteristics and drug sensitivity in hepatocellular carcinoma.