Fig. 4

Intersection analysis of the PPI network and univariate Cox regression analysis. A An interaction network was built with nodes with interaction confidence values >0.90. B Genes are ordered by the number of nodes. C Univariate Cox regression analysis was performed on selected survival-related genes with a p value < 0.05. D Venn diagram displaying the intersection of the top 30 nodes in the PPI and the most significant factors in univariate Cox regression. E Relationship between the gene expression levels of CD45 and HPSE. F The expression patterns of HPSE and CD45 in ESCC tissues were assessed using immunohistochemistry. G The correlation between HPSE and CD45 in ESCC tissues was evaluated with Spearman rank correlation (p value = 0.1782). H The correlation between HPSE and PD-L1 in ESCC tissues was evaluated with a Spearman rank correlation (p value = 0.8454)