Esophageal chemical burns as a risk factor for esophageal malignancies: in-silico analyses - experimental research

Esophageal chemical burns often occur through accidental or intentional oral consumption of chemical agents and lead to severe complications such as esophageal stricture, acute perforation, and even death. Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma is a squamous epithelium tumor that lines the normal esophagus. Additionally, adenocarcinomas are tumors located at the interface between the distal esophagus and the proximal gastric and divided into esophageal adenocarcinoma and gastric-cardia adenocarcinoma. Various conditions, such as chemical burns, are considered risk factors in the disease's pathogenesis. In the in-silico study, the authors aim to present the relationship between chemical burns and esophageal cancer by analyzing bioinformatics genetic data.

The proper gene set was extracted using the 'GEO' database. The string web tool was utilized to form the gene-interaction network. Gephi and Cytoscape software were applied to achieve network analysis.

According to in-silico data, 26 genes, including NCAPH, DLGAP5, CCNB1, KIF11, KIAA0101, CDCA5, BIRC5, NUF2, BUB1B, RRM2, TTK, CDC20, NUSAP1, CCNB2, CCNA2, MELK, TPX2, PRC1, KIF4A, CENPF, TOP2A, CDK1, ASPM, CEP55, BUB1, KIF20A were extracted that can be regarded as the most critical shared genes between chemical burns and esophageal cancer.

In sum, esophageal chemical burns can be related to the occurrence of esophageal cancer. Moreover, esophageal chemical burn is an external factor that upregulates present genes and can be regarded as a worsening prognosis or risk factor for esophageal cancer.