Research Paper Volume 13, Issue 4 pp 5120—5135
Identification of hub genes and key pathways in the emphysema phenotype of COPD
- 1 Department of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, West China Hospital of Sichuan University and Division of Pulmonary Diseases, State Key Laboratory of Biotherapy of China, Chengdu 610041, China
- 2 Respiratory Ward, Department of Geriatrics, Sichuan Provincial People's Hospital, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, China
- 3 Department of Thoracic Surgery, Sichuan Provincial People's Hospital, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, China
Received: September 21, 2020 Accepted: December 10, 2020 Published: February 1, 2021
https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.202432How to Cite
Copyright: © 2021 Zuo et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a heterogeneous condition associated with high morbidity and mortality. This study aimed to use weighted gene co-expression network analysis (WGCNA) to explore the molecular pathogenesis of the emphysema phenotype of COPD. After obtaining lung mRNA expression profiles from ten patients with the emphysema phenotype of COPD and eight controls, emphysema-associated gene modules were identified with WGCNA. Among 13 distinct modules, the green-yellow and brown modules showed the strongest correlations with emphysema severity and lung function and were thus selected as hub modules. On gene ontology analysis, these two modules were mainly enriched in immune response, B cell receptor (BCR) signaling pathway, extracellular matrix (ECM) organization, and collagen fibril organization. Pathway analysis primarily showed enrichment in BCR signaling pathways, ECM receptor interaction, and NF-κB and TGF-β signaling pathways for the two hub modules. Several genes, including FCRLA, MS4A1, CD19, FKBP10, C1S and HTRA1, among others, were identified as hub genes. Our results shed light on the potential genetic mechanisms underlying the pathogenesis of the emphysema phenotype of COPD. However, further research will be needed to confirm the involvement of the identified genes and to determine their therapeutic relevance.