Identification of Candidate Biomarkers Associated with Mitochondrial Dysfunction and SUMOylation in Heart Failure...

Heart failure (HF) presents a persistent clinical challenge. While SUMOylation and mitochondrial function are vital for cardiomyocyte health, their combined influence on HF remains elusive. Two HF-related datasets were downloaded from GEO. The overlapping genes were obtained from all genes in the training set, SUMO-related genes, and mitochondrial-related genes. Three machine learning algorithms were applied to identify diagnostic key genes. Subsequently, diagnostic models were constructed and evaluated based on these genes. Besides, the immune microenvironment in HF versus healthy controls was assessed using CIBERSORT, MCP-counter, and ssGSEA. The differences in immune infiltration between HF and healthy controls were analyzed. Drug prediction and molecular docking were performed to identify potential drug candidates targeting these genes. Finally, qPCR was employed to validate gene expression levels in clinical samples. A total of 113 common genes with notable enrichment in mitochondrial regulation were identified. Five key genes, namely NFKB1, MYEF2, NSUN2, SQSTM1, and FKBP4, were identified by three machine learning algorithms. Functional enrichment analyses linked these genes to immune response, RNA processing, and cell cycle regulation. Moreover, immune infiltration profiling revealed that neutrophil infiltration contributes to dysregulated immune responses in HF. Molecular docking revealed that the small-molecule drug IMX-942 has a favorable binding affinity with SQSTM1 (-5.8 kcal/mol). qPCR validation supported the bioinformatics results. NFKB1, MYEF2, NSUN2, SQSTM1, and FKBP4 were identified as key genes linking SUMOylation and mitochondrial function in HF. These findings provide new insights into HF pathophysiology and may contribute to the development of novel diagnostic and therapeutic strategies.