title: Microarray-based characterization of differential gene expression during vocal fold wound healing in rats.
abstract: The vocal fold (VF) mucosa confers elegant biomechanical function for voice production but is susceptible to scar formation following injury. Current understanding of VF wound healing is hindered by a paucity of data and is therefore often generalized from research conducted in skin and other mucosal systems. Here, using a previously validated rat injury model, expression microarray technology and an empirical Bayes analysis approach, we generated a VF-specific transcriptome dataset to better capture the system-level complexity of wound healing in this specialized tissue. We measured differential gene expression at 3, 14 and 60 days post-injury compared to experimentally naïve controls, pursued functional enrichment analyses to refine and add greater biological definition to the previously proposed temporal phases of VF wound healing, and validated the expression and localization of a subset of previously unidentified repair- and regeneration-related genes at the protein level. Our microarray dataset is a resource for the wider research community and has the potential to stimulate new hypotheses and avenues of investigation, improve biological and mechanistic insight, and accelerate the identification of novel therapeutic targets.
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Division of Otolaryngology, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI 53792, USA welham@surgery.wisc.edu.
authors.forename: Nathan V
authors.initials: NV
authors.lastname: Welham
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Division of Otolaryngology, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI 53792, USA.
authors.forename: Changying
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Ling
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics and Medical Informatics, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI 53706, USA.
authors.forename: John A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Dawson
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics and Medical Informatics, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI 53706, USA.
authors.forename: Christina
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Kendziorski
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Division of Otolaryngology, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI 53792, USA.
authors.forename: Susan L
authors.initials: SL
authors.lastname: Thibeault
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Division of Otolaryngology, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison, WI 53792, USA.
authors.forename: Masaru
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Yamashita
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling / Q000379:methods*; D005786:Gene Expression Regulation; D008297:Male; D020411:Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis; D011916:Rats, Inbred F344; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D013997:Time Factors; D014827:Vocal Cords / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000473:pathology*; D014945:Wound Healing / Q000235:genetics*
keywords: Fibrosis; Larynx; Scar formation; Tissue repair; Transcriptome