Fig. 6: Validation of the tumor and TME interaction patterns for patient stratification using bulk transcriptomic data.

a Hierarchical clustering of ligand–receptor interaction activities in LCI cohort. Each column represents a tumor sample. Each row represents a pair. The direction of each interaction pair is indicated by color. Purple, tumor provides ligands and interacts with receptors from the TME; green, TME provides ligands and interacts with receptors from tumor; light purple, both directions (pairs were identified in both directions from single-cell analysis but can only be modeled once in bulk data). b The proportion of each pair in Cluster 1 of three HCC cohorts. Error bar, mean ± standard error of the mean. c Overall survival of patients from Cluster 1 and Cluster 2 in three HCC cohorts and the corresponding non-tumor cohorts. Cluster 1 and Cluster 2 were determined based on hierarchical clustering of ligand–receptor interaction activities in (a) and Supplementary Fig. 15a. The number of samples in each cohort was provided. Log-rank test was preformed to show the statistical difference of the two groups.