Expression profiles and prognostic value of FABPs in colorectal adenocarcinomas

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is one of the world’s leading causes of cancer-related deaths; thus, it is important to detect it as early as possible. Obesity is thought to be linked to a large rise in the CRC incidence as a result of bad dietary choices, such as a high intake of animal fats. Fatty acid-binding proteins (FABPs) are a set of molecules that coordinate intracellular lipid responses and are highly associated with metabolism and inflammatory pathways. There are nine types of FABP genes that have been found in mammals, which are FABP1–7, FABP9, and FABP12. Each FABP gene has its own roles in different organs of the body; hence, each one has different expression levels in different cancers. The roles of FABP family genes in the development of CRC are still poorly understood. We used a bioinformatics approach to examine FABP family gene expression profiles using the Oncomine, GEPIA, PrognoScan, STRING, cBioPortal, MetaCore, and TIMER platforms. Results showed that the FABP6 messenger (m)RNA level is overexpressed in CRC cells compared to normal cells. The overexpression of FABP6 was found to be related to poor prognosis in CRC patients’ overall survival. The immunohistochemical results in the Human Protein Atlas showed that FABP1 and FABP6 exhibited strong staining in CRC tissues. An enrichment analysis showed that high expression of FABP6 was significantly correlated with the role of microRNAs in cell proliferation in the development of CRC through the insulin-like growth factor (IGF) signaling pathway. FABP6 functions as an intracellular bile-acid transporter in the ileal epithelium. We looked at FABP6 expression in CRC since bile acids are important in the carcinogenesis of CRC. In conclusion, high FABP6 expression is expected to be a potential biomarker for detecting CRC at the early stage.