Genome-wide isoform-level analysis reveals tumor-specific isoforms for lung adenocarcinoma diagnosis and prognosis

•We comprehensively characterize expression variations of mRNA isoforms in lung adenocarcinoma.•Some isoforms showed distinct variations with their host genes.•We identified hundreds of isoforms that expressed exclusively in tumor samples.•Some isoforms could separate tumor patients by overall survival. Last decades have witnessed the great progress in exploration of tumor transcriptome. However, most researches were restricted in gene-level expression. mRNA isoforms, especially tumor-specific isoforms have not been fully explored in tumor. Here, by analyzing RNA-seq data derived from hundreds of samples in TCGA projects, we comprehensively characterized the expression variations of mRNA isoforms in adenocarcinoma of lung (LUAD), which is one of leading causes of cancer-related death. Our analysis found that a variety of mRNA isoforms showed differential expression in LUAD tumor samples. Some of them even showed distinct variations compared to their host genes. Further analysis of functional enrichment revealed that up- and down-regulated mRNA isoforms took part in different types of biological process. In addition, we also identified hundreds of isoforms that expressed exclusively in LUAD tumor samples. Furthermore, the expression level of several isoforms, such as uc001kuk.3 and uc003yls.2, could separate tumor patients by overall survival periods. Our study provided new candidates for the diagnosis and prognosis of lung cancer.