DÖRT FARKLI KANSERE AİT TRANSKRİPTOM VERİSİNİN IN SILICO KARŞILAŞTIRILMASI VE PANKREAS KANSERİNE ÖZGÜ BİYOBELİRTEÇ ADAYLARININ BELİRLENMESİ

Abstract

Pancreatic cancer is the 11th most common cancer worldwide. Five-year survival of lung, colon and stomach cancers, which are the top three in cancer related deaths, are 19%, 65% and 20%, respectively. Although pancreatic cancer ranks seventh in cancer related deaths, it is one of the deadliest neoplasms because of the 9% five-year survival rate. Basic mutations that play roles in pancreatic cancer and distrupt signaling pathways have been described in the literature. However, pancreas cancer specific molecular targets, which contribute to aggressive and metastatic predisposition of pancreatic cancer than other epithelial cancers, have not been described in detail. In addition, new treatment targets and prognostic/predictive biomarkers for pancreatic cancer are essential. Considering these, in this proposed thesis study, it is aimed to determine the gene espressions that drive pancreatic cancer more lethal status than other epithelial tumors and to investigate the biological processes involving these genes. In our study, transcriptome data from pancreatic cancer, lung cancer, gastric cancer and colon cancer were analyzed and compared in silico. The roles of differentially expressed genes in pancreatic cancer on biological processes and survival were investigated. As a result of our study, fourteen genes that play multiple roles in metabolism, immunity, cell death processes and metastatic character in pancreatic cancer were determined as candidates for biomarkers. The fact that the literature review of the biomarker candidates supports our findings shows that the methodological approach we applied in the design of our thesis, analysis approaches and selection of the tools used was successful.