title: Lysosome and Cytoskeleton Pathways Are Robustly Enriched in the Blood of Septic Patients: A Meta-Analysis of Transcriptomic Data.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Sepsis is a leading cause of mortality in intensive care units worldwide. A better understanding of the blood systems response to sepsis should expedite the identification of biomarkers for early diagnosis and therapeutic interventions.
  
  
  METHODS
  We analyzed microarray studies whose data is available from the GEO repository and which were performed on the whole blood of septic patients and normal controls.
  
  
  RESULTS
  We identified 6 cohorts consisting of 450 individuals (sepsis = 323, control = 127) providing genome-wide messenger RNA (mRNA) expression data. Through meta-analysis we found the "Lysosome" and "Cytoskeleton" pathways were upregulated in human sepsis patients relative to controls, in addition to previously known signaling pathways (including MAPK, TLR). The key regulatory genes in the "Lysosome" pathway include lysosomal acid hydrolases (e.g., protease cathepsin A, D) as well as the major (LAMP1, 2) and minor (SORT1, LAPTM4B) membrane proteins. In contrast, pathways related to "Ribosome", "Spliceosome" and "Cell adhesion molecules" were found to be downregulated, along with known pathways for immune dysfunction. Overall, our study revealed distinct mRNA activation profiles and protein-protein interaction networks in blood of human sepsis.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our findings suggest that aberrant mRNA expression in the lysosome and cytoskeleton pathways may play a pivotal role in the molecular pathobiology of human sepsis.
authors.affiliation: Division of Allergy & Clinical Immunology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21224, USA ; Department of Critical Care Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-Sen University, China.
authors.forename: Jie
authors.identifier: 0000-0003-4147-933X
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.affiliation: Division of Allergy & Clinical Immunology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21224, USA ; Department of Critical Care Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-Sen University, China.
authors.forename: Chuanxi
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: Division of Cardiology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21287, USA.
authors.forename: Andreas S
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Barth
authors.affiliation: Division of Allergy & Clinical Immunology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21224, USA.
authors.forename: Chris
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Cheadle
authors.affiliation: Department of Critical Care Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-Sen University, China.
authors.forename: Xiangdong
authors.identifier: 0000-0001-7057-2424
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Guan
authors.affiliation: Division of Allergy & Clinical Immunology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21224, USA.
authors.forename: Li
authors.identifier: 0000-0001-6470-5905
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Gao
mesh_terms: D003599:Cytoskeleton / Q000378:metabolism*; D006801:Humans; D008247:Lysosomes / Q000378:metabolism*; D020935:MAP Kinase Signaling System; D018805:Sepsis / Q000097:blood; D015398:Signal Transduction; D059467:Transcriptome