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Joyce F. Liu, MD, MPH
Joyce F. Liu, MD, MPH
Posted: Monday, March 31, 2025
The gene UBE2J1 has been identified as a novel oncogene in patients with high-grade serous ovarian cancer, according to the results of a study published in the Journal of Translational Medicine. The study results helped create a prognostic model to help identify high-risk patients.
Investigators, including corresponding author Shan Kang, MD, of the Fourth Hospital of Hebei Medical University in China, sought to find key immune cell types in the tumor microenvironment and identify prognostic indicators in certain genes that could help to characterize patients at a higher risk for developing high-grade serous ovarian cancer. They explored gene sequencing data from patients with high-grade serous ovarian cancer across various databases.
A prognostic model was created to identify marker genes that were associated with overall survival. They focused on plasma cell-related genes as their role has been unclear in relation to high-grade serous ovarian cancer. Eighteen key marker genes were identified
UBE2J1 is an E2 ubiquitin-conjugating enzyme that inhibits the apoptosis of endometrial cancer cells through the PI3K/AKT as well as MDM2/p53 pathways. Overexpression of UBE2J1 was found to promote proliferation, migration, invasion, and colony formation of cell lines. Its expression and knockdown altered the expression of EMT markers. Expression of UBE2J1 is correlated with expression of CD44 and PDCD1, which suggests an association with immunotherapy response.
"To our knowledge, this is the first study revealing the role of UBE2J1 in HGSOC,” noted Dr. Kang and colleagues. “The co-culture system of ovarian cancer cells and tumor-infiltrating T cells needs to be established to study the effect of UBE2J1 on the interaction between ovarian cancer cells and immune cells.”
Disclosure: For full disclosures of the study authors, view the full article here.
Journal of Translational Medicine
