Bioinformatics Analysis Explores Potential Hub Genes in Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease

Background: Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is now recognized as the most prevalent chronic liver disease worldwide. However, the dysregulated gene expression for NAFLD is still poorly understood.Material and methods: We analyzed two public datasets (GSE48452 and GSE89632) to identify diffe...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Chutian Wu, Yun Zhou, Min Wang, Guolin Dai, Xiongxiu Liu, Leizhen Lai, Shaohui Tang
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Frontiers Media S.A. 2021-10-01
Series:Frontiers in Genetics
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Online Access:https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fgene.2021.772487/full
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Summary:Background: Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is now recognized as the most prevalent chronic liver disease worldwide. However, the dysregulated gene expression for NAFLD is still poorly understood.Material and methods: We analyzed two public datasets (GSE48452 and GSE89632) to identify differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in NAFLD. Then, we performed a series of bioinformatics analyses to explore potential hub genes in NAFLD.Results: This study included 26 simple steatosis (SS), 34 nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), and 13 healthy controls (HC). We observed 6 up- and 19 down-regulated genes in SS, and 13 up- and 19 down-regulated genes in NASH compared with HC. Meanwhile, the overlapping pathways between SS and NASH were PI3K-Akt signaling pathway and pathways in cancer. Then, we screened out 10 hub genes by weighted Gene Co-Expression Network Analysis (WGCNA) and protein-protein interaction (PPI) networks. Eventually, we found that CYP7A1/GINS2/PDLIM3 were associated with the prognosis of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in the TCGA database.Conclusion: Although further validation is still needed, we provide useful and novel information to explore the potential candidate genes for NAFLD prognosis and therapeutic options.
ISSN:1664-8021