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Research Paper|Volume 13, Issue 22|pp 24511—24523

Hyperbaric oxygen therapy induces transcriptome changes in elderly: a prospective trial

Amir Hadanny1,2,3,4, Relly Forer5, Dina Volodarsky5, Malka Daniel-Kotovsky1, Merav Catalogna1, Yonatan Zemel1,4, Yair Bechor1,4, Shai Efrati1,2,4,6
  • 1The Sagol Center for Hyperbaric Medicine and Research, Shamir (Assaf-Harofeh) Medical Center, Zerifin, Israel
  • 2Sackler School of Medicine, Tel-Aviv University, Tel-Aviv, Israel
  • 3Bar Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
  • 4Aviv Scientific LTD, Bnei-Brak, Israel
  • 5Dyn Diagnostics, Zerifin, Israel
  • 6Sagol School of Neuroscience, Tel-Aviv University, Tel-Aviv, Israel
Received: November 23, 2020Accepted: November 11, 2021Published: November 24, 2021
https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.203709

Copyright: © 2021 Hadanny 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

Introduction: Aging is characterized by the progressive loss of physiological capacity. Changes in gene expression can alter activity in defined age-related molecular pathways leading to cellular aging and increased aging disease susceptibility. The aim of the current study was to evaluate whether hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) affects gene expression in normal, non-pathological, aging adults.

Methods: Thirty-five healthy independently living adults, aged 64 and older, were enrolled to receive 60 daily HBOT exposures. Whole blood samples were collected at baseline, at the 30th and 60th HBOT session, and 1–2 weeks following the last session. Differential gene expression analysis was performed.

Results: Following 60 sessions of HBOT, 1342 genes and 570 genes were differently up- and downregulated (1912 total), respectively (p < 0.01 FDR), compared to baseline. Out of which, five genes were downregulated with a >1.5-fold change: ABCA13 (FC = −2.28), DNAJ6 (FC = −2.16), HBG2 (FC = −1.56), PDXDC1 (FC = −1.53), RANBP17 (FC = −1.75). Two weeks post-HBOT, ABCA13 expression was significantly downregulated with a >1.5fold change (FC = −1.54, p = 0.008).

In conclusion, for the first time in humans, the study provides direct evidence of HBOT is associated with transcriptome changes in whole-blood samples. Our results demonstrate significant changes in gene expression of normal aging population.