Searching for Key Genes in Ulcerative Colitis: a Bioinformatics Study

Abstract

Objective: The incidence of ulcerative colitis (UC) is increasing year by year, which leads to increasing cost of medical resources investment, and the exact pathogenesis of the disease is still unclear, leading to difficulties in clinical diagnosis and treatment. This study is based on a bioinformatics approach to search for possible key genes leading to the development of this disease, hoping to provide clinicians with new biomarkers that can be used for reference, so that patients can receive timely diagnosis and treatment.Methods: Peripheral blood-related information was first obtained from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database for UC patients and non-UC populations. Then differentially expressed genes were identified using R language (based on "Limma" software). Functional enrichment analysis was then performed, followed by screening of central genes, and finally correlations between the central genes were investigated using Spearman correlation analysis.Results: Fifty-nine up-regulated and 39 down-regulated DEGs were screened. These genes were involved in pathways such as viral protein-cytokine receptor interaction, cytokine-cytokine receptor interaction, biosynthesis of pantothenic acid and coenzyme A, IL-17 signaling pathway and chemokine signaling pathway. And growth regulatory alpha protein, C-X-C chemokine receptor 1, C-C patterned chemokine 2, and trigger receptor 1 expressed in bone marrow cells were found to be the top ten hub genes. The final correlation analysis showed a positive correlation between these ten hub genes.Conclusion The present study identified 10 DEGs as possible biomarkers for the diagnosis of patients with ulcerative colitis. Experiments are needed to validate the present study.