Apelin (APLN) is recently demonstrated a direct association with many malignant diseases. However, its effects on cervical cancer remain unclear. This study therefore aims to evaluate the association between APLN expression and cervical cancer using publicly available data from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA). The Pearson χ² test and Fish exact test, as well as logistic regression, were used to evaluate the relationship between clinicopathological factors in cervical cancer and the expression of APLN. Additionally, the Cox regression and Kaplan-Meier methods were conducted to analyze the Overall Survival (OS) of cervical cancer patients in TCGA. Finally, gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA) was performed to establish its biological functions. High expression of APLN in cervical cancer was significantly associated with a more advanced clinical stage (OR = 1.91 (1.21–3.05) for Stage II, Stage III, and Stage IV vs Stage I, p = 0.006). Additionally, it was associated with poor outcome after primary therapy (OR = 2.14 (1.03–4.59) for Progressive Disease (PD), Stable Disease (SD), and Partial Response (PR) vs Complete Remission (CR), p = 0.045) and high histologic grade (OR = 1.67 (1.03–2.72) for G3 and G4 vs G1 and G2, p = 0.037). Moreover, multivariate analysis showed that high expression of APLN was associated with a shorter OS. GSEA demonstrated that six KEGG pathways, including PPAR signaling, ECM-receptor interaction, focal adhesion, MAPK signaling, TGF-beta signaling, and Gap junction pathways were differentially enriched in the high expression APLN phenotype. The recent study suggests that APLN plays an important role in the progression of cervical cancer and might be a promising prognostic biomarker of the disease.

最近证明 Apelin (APLN) 与许多恶性疾病有直接关联。然而，其对宫颈癌的影响仍不清楚。因此，本研究旨在利用癌症基因组图谱 (TCGA) 的公开数据来评估 APLN 表达与宫颈癌之间的关联。采用Pearson χ ²检验、Fish精确检验以及Logistic回归分析宫颈癌临床病理因素与APLN表达的关系。此外，还采用 Cox 回归和 Kaplan-Meier 方法分析 TCGA 中宫颈癌患者的总生存期 (OS)。最后，进行基因集富集分析（GSEA）以确定其生物学功能。宫颈癌中 APLN 的高表达与更晚期的临床分期显着相关（II 期、III 期和 IV 期与 I 期相比，OR = 1.91 (1.21–3.05)，p = 0.006 ）  。此外，它与主要治疗后的不良结局相关（疾病进展 (PD)、疾病稳定 (SD) 和部分缓解 (PR) 与完全缓解 (CR) 的 OR = 2.14 (1.03–4.59)，p = 0.045  ）和高组织学分级（G3 和 G4 与 G1 和 G2 相比，OR = 1.67 (1.03–2.72)，p  = 0.037）。此外，多变量分析表明 APLN 的高表达与较短的 OS 相关。GSEA 证明，包括 PPAR 信号传导、ECM 受体相互作用、粘着斑、MAPK 信号传导、TGF-β 信号传导和间隙连接通路在内的 6 种 KEGG 通路在高表达 APLN 表型中差异富集。最近的研究表明，APLN 在宫颈癌的进展中发挥着重要作用，并且可能是该疾病的一个有前途的预后生物标志物。