Abstract

Background: Alpha and Gamma Adaptin Binding protein p34 (AAGAB) was previously reported as a novel on- treatment biomarker can improve prediction of response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy in breast cancer. However, the expression and prognostic value of AAGAB in breast cancer is unknown, the function of AAGAB remains to be elucidated

Methods: Herein we investigated the role of AAGAB in human breast cancer from the GEO and TCGA databases, immunohistochemistry, Gene Set Enrichment Analysis (GSEA) and immune infiltration analysis

Results: The expression of AAGAB in breast cancer was significantly up-regulated relative to normal tissue (all p-values<0.05) in GEO and TCGA databases. Kaplan-Meier survival analysis showed that breast cancer patients with AAGAB-high had a worse prognosis than that with AAGAB-low (p=0.005). Univariate analysis using logistic regression revealed that age, pathological stage, and number of lymph nodes were significantly associated with poor Overall Survival (OS) (all p<0.05). Functional annotations indicated that AAGAB is involved in the most significant signaling pathways including intra Golgi traffic and peroxisomal lipid metabolism pathways.

Conclusions: Our study revealed that elevated AAGAB expression was significantly correlated with aggressive progression, poor survival in patients. AAGAB may serve as a new biomarker and potential treatment target in breast cancer.

Keywords: Breast cancer; AAGAB; Biomarker; Survival analysis; Prognosis