A novel mitochondrial-related signature to decode tumor immunity and predict survival in chromophobe renal cell carcinoma.

Chromophobe renal cell carcinoma (chRCC) comprises about 5%-10% of all renal cancer cases, some of which are aggressive and metastatic. Mitochondria are significantly activated in chRCC, however, a risk model based on mitochondrial-related genes for chRCC has not been constructed to date. We constructed a novel mitochondrial-related risk model consisting of TIMM8A, RECQL4, MTERF1, and DUS2. Our model highlighted distinct immune infiltration patterns between the different risk groups. Moreover, the TME signature genes and immune regulatory factors were significantly associated with the risk scores. Combining the risk score with immune/stromal score and TMB can improve the accuracy of the risk model in patient stratification and prognosis prediction. Notably, our computational analysis based on GDSC's pRRophetic algorithm suggests that LCL161 and UMI-77 may be more effective in the low-risk group, while sapitinib and luminespib show potential efficacy in the high-risk group. In conclusion, our study indicates this model holds high promise as a reliable biomarker for outcome prediction and precision-medicine stratification in chRCC patients.