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At least 127 records · Page 7Linked to original sources

Association Analysis of the Circulating Proteome With Sarcopenia-Related Traits Reveals Potential Drug Targets for Sarcopenia.

BACKGROUND: Sarcopenia severely affects the physical health of the elderly. Currently, there is no specific drug available for sarcopenia. This study aims to identify pathogenic proteins and druggable targets for sarcopenia through Mendelian randomization (MR)-based analytical framework. METHODS: A sequential stepwise screening method that includes two-sample MR, Steiger filtering test and colocalization (MRSC) was applied to identify causal proteins associated with sarcopenia-related traits. In the MR analyses, 4372 circulating proteins with valid instrumental variables (IVs) from eight proteomic genome-wide association studies were utilized as exposures, and nine sarcopenia-related traits were utilized as outcomes. IVs were classified into cis-protein quantitative trait loci (pQTLs) and trans-pQTLs based on their positions. We conducted cis-only MRSC analyses and cis&#x2009;+&#x2009;trans MRSC analyses using cis-pQTLs and cis&#x2009;+&#x2009;trans pQTLs as IVs, respectively. Post-MRSC analyses were conducted on the prioritized findings of MRSC, including annotation of protein-altering variants (PAVs), assessment of overlap between pQTLs and expression quantitative trait loci (eQTLs), protein-protein interaction (PPI) analysis, pathway enrichment analysis and annotation of drug targets. Utilizing data from the UK Biobank, we performed an observational study to explore the associations between baseline circulating protein levels and the longitudinal changes in nine sarcopenia-related traits. RESULTS: A total of 181 causal associations for 65 proteins were prioritized by the cis-only MRSC analyses and 227 associations for 91 proteins were prioritized by the cis&#x2009;+&#x2009;trans MRSC analyses. Among the prioritized proteins, the majority of them employed non-PAVs as IVs and most of their cis-pQTLs overlapped with corresponding eQTLs and exhibited consistent directionality, with only one trans-pQTL overlapping with an eQTL. The PPI network of cis-only MRSC-prioritized proteins (p&#x2009;=&#x2009;4.04&#x2009;&#xd7;&#x2009;10-4) and cis&#x2009;+&#x2009;trans MRSC-prioritized proteins (p&#x2009;=&#x2009;8.76&#x2009;&#xd7;&#x2009;10-5) showed significantly more interactions than expected. Reactome, KEGG and GO pathway enrichment analyses for cis-only MRSC-prioritized proteins identified 52, 12 and 79 enriched pathways, respectively (adjusted p&#x2009;<&#x2009;0.05). For proteins identified by cis&#x2009;+&#x2009;trans MRSC analyses, only 15 pathways were enriched through the GO pathway enrichment analyses. In the observational study, 197 circulating proteins were identified to be associated with one or more sarcopenia-related traits (p&#x2009;<&#x2009;0.05/2923). Among them, the significant associations of CTSB (negative association) and ASGR1 (positive association) with sarcopenia-related traits were observed to have consistent directional associations in both MR-based studies and observational studies. Drug target annotations suggested that 52 MRSC-prioritized proteins and 145 biomarkers are drug targets or druggable. CONCLUSIONS: This study identified 89 potential pathogenic proteins and 197 candidate biomarkers for sarcopenia, providing valuable clues for the development of therapeutic drugs for sarcopenia.

Humans↗

Application of transcriptome analysis to clinical pharmacology studies.

Clinical pharmacology is the investigation of drug effects in humans. This review discusses the basic tenets of clinical pharmacology research, including pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic analysis, therapeutic window, and clinical trial design, and the issues that may arise in the application of transcriptome analysis to clinical pharmacology studies. Examples of how transcriptome analysis can be applied to clinical pharmacology research are described, including a model system of endotoxin challenge (in vitro and in vivo), and an example of a cross-over drug study in normal volunteers. Various data display and analysis methods are also illustrated, including principal component analysis, hierarchical cluster analysis, and pathways analysis.

Animals↗

Microarrays: interrogating the transplant transcriptosome.

The use of DNA microarrays as a hypothesis generation tool for determining gene expression differences across thousands of genes in a data set is increasing. Recently, the use of microarrays has been applied to the transplant field and holds great promise for unraveling the mechanisms at play in various transplant processes and for identifying new tissue-specific and noninvasive biomarkers predictive of clinical outcomes. As microarrays produce large amounts of data, bioinformatics tools are being developed to determine gene expression patterns. Gene clustering and class prediction tools aid in the discovery of molecular signatures in different disease processes while literature mining, gene family analysis and pathway analysis helps in understanding the biological relevance of these signatures. This chapter focuses on DNA microarrays, their application to transplantation, and reviews key research studies where DNA microarrays are applied to understand acute rejection, chronic rejection and tolerance in human transplantation.

Graft Rejection↗

Products derived from 5,8,11-eicosatrienoic acid by the 5-lipoxygenase-leukotriene pathway.

Analysis of products derived from 5,8,11-eicosatrienoic acid via the 5-lipoxygenase-leukotriene pathway showed that this fatty acid is readily converted to leukotriene (LT)A3. When 10,000 X g supernatant from rat basophilic leukemia cell homogenates was incubated with 30 microM fatty acid, 5,8,11-eicosatrienoic acid produced 6.2 +/- 1.1 nmol of LTA3 and arachidonic acid 15.5 +/- 1.9 nmol of LTA4 (n = 4). However, only insignificant amounts of LTB3 were formed (0.15 +/- 0.04 nmol of LTB3 and 4.2 +/- 0.4 nmol of LTB4, n = 4). These data indicate that the LTA-hydrolase requires not only the three double bonds of the triene but also the double bond at C-14 to efficiently convert LTA to LTB. These findings have significant implications for essential fatty acid deficiency.

8,11,14-Eicosatrienoic Acid↗

Intracellular degradation of the HIV-1 envelope glycoprotein. Evidence for, and some characteristics of, an endoplasmic reticulum degradation pathway.

Analysis of the fate of HIV-1 envelope protein gp160 (Env) has shown that newly synthesized proteins may be degraded within the biosynthetic pathway and that this degradation may take place in compartments other than the lysosomes. The fate of newly synthesized Env was studied in living BHK-21 cells with the recombinant vaccinia virus expression system. We found that gp160 not only undergoes physiological endoproteolytic cleavage, producing gp120, but is also degraded, producing proteolytic fragments of 120 kDa to 26 kDa in size, as determined by SDS/PAGE in non reducing conditions. Analysis of the 120-kDa proteolytic fragment, and comparison with gp120, showed that it is composed of peptides linked by disulfides bonds and lacks the V3-loop epitope and the C-terminal domain of gp120 (amino acids 506-516). A permeabilized cell system, with impaired transport of labeled Env from the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) to Golgi compartments, was developed to determine the site of degradation and to define some biochemical characteristics of the intracellular degradation process. In the semipermeable BHK-21 cells, there was: (a) no gp120 production (b), a progressive decrease in the amount of newly synthesized gp160 and a concomitant increase in the amount of a 120-kDa proteolytic fragment. This fragment had the same biochemical characteristics as the 120-kDa proteolytic fragment found in living nonpermeabilized cells, and (c) susceptibility of the V3 loop. This degradation process occurred in the ER, as shown by both biochemical and indirect immunofluorescence analysis. Furthermore, there was evidence that changes in redox state are involved in the ER-dependent envelope degradation pathway because adding reducing agents to permeabilized cells caused dose-dependent degradation of the 120-kDa proteolytic fragment and of the remaining gp160 glycoprotein. Thus our results provide direct evidence that regulated degradation of the HIV-1 envelope glycoprotein may take place in the ER of infected cells.

Animals↗

PathwayVote: an R package for robust pathway enrichment analysis for DNA methylation data using a consensus-based voting framework.

MOTIVATION: Pathway enrichment analysis is commonly used to interpret epigenomewide association studies, yet conventional methods often rely on arbitrary thresholds and simplified CpG-gene mappings, making them sensitive to analytical choices and unable to fully leverage CpG-gene relationships Recent advances in expression quantitative trait methylation (eQTM) studies offer a rich resource to refine these mappings, but are rarely utilized in DNA methylation enrichment pipelines. RESULTS: We developed PathwayVote, an R package that implements a voting-based consensus approach and leverages eQTM data to identify robustly enriched pathways. PathwayVote reduces dependence on arbitrary cutoffs and improves sensitivity and reproducibility of enrichment results. AVAILABILITY AND IMPLEMENTATION: PathwayVote is freely available on GitHub (https://github.com/YinanZheng/PathwayVote) under the GPL-3 license and CRAN: https://CRAN.R-project.org/package=PathwayVote. The version of the code corresponding to this manuscript has been archived on Zenodo (https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17209507).

Humans↗

Concurrent or sequential delta and beta TCR gene rearrangement during thymocyte development: individual thymi follow distinct pathways.

Analysis of TCR rearrangement profiles of well-defined thymocyte populations in a number of individual thymi provides evidence for a new pathway of lineage commitment. In all of the thymi analyzed, alphabeta thymocytes have rearrangements in the delta locus that are enhanced for out-of-frame rearrangements. Thus, not only did alphabeta thymocytes pass through a stage in differentiation that included delta rearrangement, but they also constitute a population that was relatively unsuccessful at these rearrangements. Interestingly, in some thymi, gammadelta thymocytes have out-of-frame beta rearrangements. This represents a novel pathway in which delta and beta rearrangement happens concurrently. In this pathway, selection favors whichever gene is in frame, thus improving the chances of generating useful T cells. In other thymi, gammadelta cells showed no obvious beta gene rearrangement, indicating a sequential rearrangement. Thus, alphabeta/gammadelta lineage commitment can follow at least two distinct pathways in different individuals.

Cell Differentiation↗

Role of the agnoprotein in regulation of simian virus 40 replication and maturation pathways.

Analysis of two agnogene mutants, dl2304 deleted over the entire agnogene and in2379 carrying a 2-base insert, indicated that the mutant phenotype of small plaque formation must be the result of a defect late in the maturation pathway. Both mutants were removed from the pool of molecules available for replication with wild-type kinetics. Whereas dl2304 was somewhat reduced in its rate of progression from chromatin to previrions-virions, in2379, which produced even smaller plaques than dl2304 did, progressed with wild-type kinetics. Therefore, the agnoprotein was not required for progression from chromatin to previrions.

Chromatin↗

The folding of hen lysozyme involves partially structured intermediates and multiple pathways.

Analysis of the folding of hen lysozyme shows that the protein does not become organized in a single cooperative event but that different parts of the structure become stabilized with very different kinetics. In particular, in most molecules the alpha-helical domain folds faster than the beta-sheet domain. Furthermore, different populations of molecules fold by kinetically distinct pathways. Thus, folding is not a simple sequential assembly process but involves parallel alternative pathways, some of which may involve substantial reorganization steps.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

Deriving phylogenetic trees from the similarity analysis of metabolic pathways.

MOTIVATION: Comparative analysis of metabolic pathways in different genomes can give insights into the understanding of evolutionary and organizational relationships among species. This type of analysis allows one to measure the evolution of complete processes (with different functional roles) rather than the individual elements of a conventional analysis. We present a new technique for the phylogenetic analysis of metabolic pathways based on the topology of the underlying graphs. A distance measure between graphs is defined using the similarity between nodes of the graphs and the structural relationship between them. This distance measure is applied to the enzyme-enzyme relational graphs derived from metabolic pathways. Using this approach, pathways and group of pathways of different organisms are compared to each other and the resulting distance matrix is used to obtain a phylogenetic tree. RESULTS: We apply the method to the Citric Acid Cycle and the Glycolysis pathways of different groups of organisms, as well as to the Carbohydrate metabolic networks. Phylogenetic trees obtained from the experiments were close to existing phylogenies and revealed interesting relationships among organisms.

Algorithms↗

Epigenetic telomere protection by Drosophila DNA damage response pathways.

Analysis of terminal deletion chromosomes indicates that a sequence-independent mechanism regulates protection of Drosophila telomeres. Mutations in Drosophila DNA damage response genes such as atm/tefu, mre11, or rad50 disrupt telomere protection and localization of the telomere-associated proteins HP1 and HOAP, suggesting that recognition of chromosome ends contributes to telomere protection. However, the partial telomere protection phenotype of these mutations limits the ability to test if they act in the epigenetic telomere protection mechanism. We examined the roles of the Drosophila atm and atr-atrip DNA damage response pathways and the nbs homolog in DNA damage responses and telomere protection. As in other organisms, the atm and atr-atrip pathways act in parallel to promote telomere protection. Cells lacking both pathways exhibit severe defects in telomere protection and fail to localize the protection protein HOAP to telomeres. Drosophila nbs is required for both atm- and atr-dependent DNA damage responses and acts in these pathways during DNA repair. The telomere fusion phenotype of nbs is consistent with defects in each of these activities. Cells defective in both the atm and atr pathways were used to examine if DNA damage response pathways regulate telomere protection without affecting telomere specific sequences. In these cells, chromosome fusion sites retain telomere-specific sequences, demonstrating that loss of these sequences is not responsible for loss of protection. Furthermore, terminally deleted chromosomes also fuse in these cells, directly implicating DNA damage response pathways in the epigenetic protection of telomeres. We propose that recognition of chromosome ends and recruitment of HP1 and HOAP by DNA damage response proteins is essential for the epigenetic protection of Drosophila telomeres. Given the conserved roles of DNA damage response proteins in telomere function, related mechanisms may act at the telomeres of other organisms.

Alleles↗

Therapeutic exploitation of the p53 pathway.

Analysis of the gene encoding p53 could serve to evaluate the effectiveness of a cancer treatment. Mutations in this gene occur in half of all human cancers, and regulation of the protein is defective in a variety of others. Novel strategies that exploit our knowledge of the function and regulation of p53 are being actively investigated. Strategies directed at treating tumours that have p53 mutations include gene therapy, viruses that only replicate in p53 deficient cells, and the search for small molecules that reactivate mutant p53. Potentiating the function of p53 in a non-genotoxic way in tumours that express wildtype protein can be achieved by inhibiting the expression and function of Mdm2 or viral oncoproteins.

Adenoviridae↗

Three-dimensional organization of rat hepatocyte cytoskeleton: relation to the asialoglycoprotein endocytosis pathway.

Analysis by confocal microscopy has revealed features of the microtubule network of rat hepatocytes in culture, establishing the three-dimensional disposition of the microtubule-based cytoskeleton, its relation to the actin-based cytoskeleton and to ligand-containing endosomes during receptor-mediated endocytosis and the alterations in its structure and disposition by the microtubule pertubant, Taxol. By co-localization studies, we have been able to demonstrate that the microtubules have a significant role in receptor-mediated endocytosis of asialoglycoproteins in this cell. Asialoorosomucoid-containing endosomes attach to widely spaced arrays of microtubules running under the baso-lateral surface of the hepatocytes 5-15 minutes after the initiation of endocytosis and then travel along microtubule paths to become concentrated with microtubules near the centrosome and at bile canaliculi after 30-60 minutes of receptor-mediated endocytosis. Receptor-mediated endocytosis is affected, but not abolished by Taxol, which inhibits the rate of asialoorosomucoid degradation at the same concentrations as those that disrupt microtubule and cytoplasmic dynein distribution, and that prevent the concentration of endosomes centrally. The results support suggestions that asialoorosomucoid-containing endosomes are captured by microtubules just below the actin layer at the cell periphery and these are actively transported centrally along microtubules, possibly by cytoplasmic dynein, so that the concentration of endosomes near the centrosome, and the subsequent efficient lysosomal degradation of ligand, are consequences of the confluence of microtubules in this region.

Actin Cytoskeleton↗

Untargeted metabolomics reveals differential metabolic pathways and biomarkers in the acute phase of Kawasaki disease.

INTRODUCTION: Kawasaki disease (KD) is one of the most common rheumatic diseases in children and manifests with multisystem clinical features. Using untargeted metabolomics, our study investigated alterations in small-molecule metabolites in plasma of children with acute KD. Our study aimed to identify differential metabolic pathways and potential biomarkers. METHODS: Plasma samples were collected from 30 children diagnosed with KD and 30 age-matched healthy controls (HC) at Jinhua Maternal and Child Health Hospital between January 2025 and December 2025. Liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) was applied to analyse plasma samples. Enriched pathways were identified using the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway analysis, and differential metabolic pathways were determined using MetaboAnalyst 5.0. Differential metabolites were screened using the nonparametric Mann-Whitney U-test and receiver operating characteristic curve area (AUC). The conservative average AUC from nested cross-validation was reported as the primary performance metric. Pearson correlation analysis was conducted to evaluate correlations between metabolites and clinical parameters. RESULTS: In total, 261 differential metabolites were identified between the KD and HC groups, including 87 lipids and lipid-like molecules, 69 organic heterocyclic compounds, 38 benzenoids, 34 organic acids, 14 phenylpropanoids, and 19 other compounds. Pathway analysis of these differential metabolites revealed 30 putatively enriched metabolic pathways for exploratory analysis. Of these pathways, primary bile acid biosynthesis, arginine biosynthesis, histidine metabolism, and phenylalanine-tyrosine-tryptophan biosynthesis were nominally associated with KD. Six metabolites with exploratory discriminatory performance (AUC&#x2009;>&#x2009;0.8) were further identified: L-tyrosine, L-tryptophan, glutamine, histidine, histamine, and taurocholic acid. A combined model incorporating these metabolites achieved an apparent AUC of 0.984 in the full dataset; nested cross-validation yielded a more conservative AUC of 0.889 (95% CI 0.798-0.968), indicating promising exploratory discriminatory performance. CONCLUSION: Untargeted metabolomics enables identification of metabolically perturbed pathways during the acute phase of KD. L-tyrosine, L-tryptophan, glutamine, histidine, histamine, and taurocholic acid may serve as candidate biomarkers for acute phase of KD.

Kawasaki disease↗

Tyr(30) of amicyanin is not critical for electron transfer to cytochrome c-551i: implications for predicting electron transfer pathways.

A Pathways analysis of the methylamine dehydrogenase-amicyanin-cytochrome c-551i protein electron transfer (ET) complex predicts two sets of ET pathways of comparable efficiency from the type I copper of amicyanin to the heme of cytochrome c-551i. In one pathway, the electron exits copper via the Cys(92) copper ligand, and in the other, it exits via the Met(98) copper ligand. If the Pathways algorithm is modified to include contributions from the anisotropy of metal-ligand coupling, independent of differences in copper-ligand bond length, then the pathways via Cys(92) are predicted to be at least 100-fold more strongly coupled than the pathways via any of the other copper ligands. All of the favored pathways via Cys(92) include a through-space jump from Cys(92) to the side chain of Tyr(30). To determine whether or not the pathways via Cys(92) are preferentially used for ET, Tyr(30) was changed to other amino acid residues by site-directed mutagenesis. Some mutant proteins were very unstable suggesting a role for Tyr(30) in stabilizing the protein structure. Y30F and Y30I mutant amicyanins could be isolated and analyzed. For the Y30I mutant, the modified Pathways analysis which favors ET via Cys(92) predicts a decrease in ET rate of at least two orders of magnitude, whereas the standard Pathways analysis predicts no change in ET rate since ET via Met(98) is not affected. Experimentally, the ET rates of the Y30I and Y30F mutants were indistinguishable from that of wild-type amicyanin. Likely explanations for these observations are discussed as are their implications for predicting pathways for ET reactions of metalloproteins.

Algorithms↗

siRNA-mediated gene silencing: a global genome view.

The task of specific gene knockdown in vitro has been facilitated through the use of short interfering RNA (siRNA), which is now widely used for studying gene function, as well as for identifying and validating new drug targets. We explored the possibility of using siRNA for dissecting cellular pathways by siRNA-mediated gene silencing followed by gene expression profiling and systematic pathway analysis. We used siRNA to eliminate the Rb1 gene in human cells and determined the effects of Rb1 knockdown on the cell by using microarray-based gene expression profiling coupled with quantitative pathway analysis using the GenMapp and MappFinder software. Retinoblastoma protein is one of the key cell cycle regulators, which exerts its function through its interactions with E2F transcription factors. Rb1 knockdown affected G1/S and G2/M transitions of the cell cycle, DNA replication and repair, mitosis, and apoptosis, indicating that siRNA-mediated transient elimination of Rb1 mimics the control of cell cycle through Rb1 dissociation from E2F. Additionally, we observed significant effects on the processes of DNA damage response and epigenetic regulation of gene expression. Analysis of transcription factor binding sites was utilized to distinguish between putative direct targets and genes induced through other mechanisms. Our approach, which combines the use of siRNA-mediated gene silencing, mediated microarray screening and quantitative pathway analysis, can be used in functional genomics to elucidate the role of the target gene in intracellular pathways. The approach also holds significant promise for compound selection in drug discovery.

Binding Sites↗

Pathway level analysis of gene expression using singular value decomposition.

BACKGROUND: A promising direction in the analysis of gene expression focuses on the changes in expression of specific predefined sets of genes that are known in advance to be related (e.g., genes coding for proteins involved in cellular pathways or complexes). Such an analysis can reveal features that are not easily visible from the variations in the individual genes and can lead to a picture of expression that is more biologically transparent and accessible to interpretation. In this article, we present a new method of this kind that operates by quantifying the level of 'activity' of each pathway in different samples. The activity levels, which are derived from singular value decompositions, form the basis for statistical comparisons and other applications. RESULTS: We demonstrate our approach using expression data from a study of type 2 diabetes and another of the influence of cigarette smoke on gene expression in airway epithelia. A number of interesting pathways are identified in comparisons between smokers and non-smokers including ones related to nicotine metabolism, mucus production, and glutathione metabolism. A comparison with results from the related approach, 'gene-set enrichment analysis', is also provided. CONCLUSION: Our method offers a flexible basis for identifying differentially expressed pathways from gene expression data. The results of a pathway-based analysis can be complementary to those obtained from one more focused on individual genes. A web program PLAGE (Pathway Level Analysis of Gene Expression) for performing the kinds of analyses described here is accessible at http://dulci.biostat.edu/pathways.

Blood Glucose↗

Modelling and analysis of metabolic pathways.

Modelling and analysis of metabolic pathways has received an increasing amount of attention over the past few years. Progress has been made in many aspects such as the identification of rate-controlling steps, applications of optimization principles, and stoichiometric analyses. In addition, the scope of modelling has also expanded. These efforts have led to an improved understanding of metabolic pathways and have facilitated their manipulation.

Bacteria↗