Immune Infiltration in Aggressive Papillary Craniopharyngioma: High infiltration But Low Action

Papillary craniopharyngiomas (PCPs) are biologically benign but clinically aggressive lesions hence affect the quality of life. The expression of inflammatory mediators and regulation of the immune microenvironment in PCPs have not been investigated much. In this study, for the first time, we assessed the immune cell infiltration and immune cell signatures in PCPs by analyzing the bulk-RNA sequencing data. Our results indicated that PCPs are in a state of high immune infiltration but low action with abundant inflammatory cells. We obtained Papillary craniopharyngioma tumor samples and normal brain tissues from the Beijing Tiantan Hospital between May 2019 and June 2020. The tumor samples were obtained after the surgical treatment and diagnosed via postoperative pathology results. Furthermore, normal brain tissues from patients with craniocerebral trauma were used for comparative purposes, and all the tissue samples were conserved in RNAlater® (Thermo Fisher Scientific, Waltham, MA) at -80 ℃ for subsequent RNA sequencing. Corresponding clinical information, including age, gender, clinical symptoms, hypothalamic invasion, tumor size, location, and prognosis status, were also collected. Finally, these tumor samples were divided into three groups based on the hypothalamic invasion level using the Puget grading system: (1) grade 0 was a low aggressive group, n = 3; (2) grade 1 was a medium aggressive group, n = 4; (3) grade 2 was a high aggressive group, n = 4.