Immunohistochemical biomarker-associated radiomics for classifying thymic epithelial tumors: a multicenter...

The subtle imaging features of thymic epithelial tumors (TETs), which comprise multiple pathological subtypes of thymoma and thymic carcinoma, are of great significance for the identification of high-risk patients. Finding the radiomics features related to the immunohistochemical markers of TETs may provide a non-invasive method for the construction of a prediction model. This retrospective study analyzed non-enhanced computed tomography (NECT) images of 307 patients with TETs from two institutions. The radiomic features were extracted, clustered, and used to develop the models with machine learning algorithms. In general, the radiomics of TET patients were profiled and clustered into three clusters, which showed differences in correlation between clinicopathological characteristics, including histological type, Masaoka stage, and immunohistochemical results. Moreover, the "original-shape-flatness" and "wavelet-LHL-first-order-Median" were the most strongly correlated with CD117 and TDT expression, and the combined model of the two demonstrated predictive efficacy for CD117/TDT expression and risk groups in training and validation cohorts. This study highlights that radiomics and biomarker-associated features can serve as a non-invasive predictive biomarker for TET patients.