Genomics of human intracranial aneurysm wall.
OBJECTIVE
The pathogenesis of intracranial aneurysms (IAs) remains elusive. Most studies have focused on individual genes, or a few interrelated genes or products, at a time in human IA. However, a broad view of pathologic mechanisms has not been investigated by identifying pathogenic genes and their interaction in networks. Our study aimed to analyze global gene expression patterns in the IA wall.


METHODS
To our knowledge, our group was the first to perform Illumina microarray analysis on human IA via comparison of aneurysm wall and superficial temporal artery tissues from 6 consecutive patients. We adopted stringent statistical criteria to the individual genes; genes with a false discovery rate <0.01 and >2-fold change were selected as differentially expressed. To identify the overrepresented biologic pathways with the differentially expressed genes, we performed hypergeometric testing of the genes selected by relaxed criteria of P<0.01 and fold change >1.5.


RESULTS
There are 326 distinct differentially expressed genes between IA and superficial temporal artery tissues (>2-fold change) with a false discovery rate <0.01. Analysis of the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes pathways revealed the most impacted functional pathways: focal adhesion, extracellular matrix receptor interaction, and cell communication. Analysis of the Gene Ontology also supported the involvement of another 2 potentially important pathways: inflammatory response and apoptosis.


CONCLUSIONS
The differentially expressed genes in the aneurysm wall may shed light on aneurysm pathobiology and provide novel targets for therapeutic intervention. These data will help generate hypotheses for future studies.
Shi
Changbin
C
Department of Neurological Surgery, Center for Genetic Medicine, and Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center, Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, Chicago, Ill 60611, USA.
Awad
Issam A
IA
Jafari
Nadereh
N
Lin
Simon
S
Du
Pan
P
Hage
Ziad A
ZA
Shenkar
Robert
R
Getch
Christopher C
CC
Bredel
Markus
M
Batjer
H Hunt
HH
Bendok
Bernard R
BR
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling; D023281:Genomics; D006801:Humans; D007107:Immune System / Q000502:physiology; D002532:Intracranial Aneurysm / Q000235:genetics* / Q000276:immunology / Q000473:pathology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D020411:Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis; D013699:Temporal Arteries / Q000276:immunology / Q000473:pathology / Q000502:physiology*