Differential Genes And MicroRNAs In Pterygium Were Studied Based On Bioinformatics Method

Objective: Gene chip data can be used to investigate the key genes and miRNAs(microRNAs)of pterygium at a high throughput level,which has a significant advantage in studying the pathogenesis of pterygium.At present,the etiology of pterygium is still not completely clear,so the purpose of this study is to analyze the genes and miRNAs related to pterygium from the perspective of bioinformatics and verify them by experiments,so as to determine the molecular mechanism of pterygium and provide new targets and theoretical basis for the treatment of pterygium.METHODS: Firstly,the Gene microarray and miRNA microarray data of human pterygium were retrieved from the Gene Expression Omnibus database.The differential genes and differential miRNAs were screened by GEO2 R online tool,and the core genes were screened by Cytoscape software.The target genes of differential miRNAs were predicted by miRDB online tool.Then,David(The Database for Annotation Visualization and Integrated Discovery)software is used to conduct pathway enrichment analysis for differential genes and target genes.Finally,the differential miRNAs(miR-142-5p)were selected for Quantitative real-time polymerase chain reation(Quantitative real-time PCR)assay,and the differential genes and differential miRNAs were analyzed in combination with relevant references.RESULTS: By differential analysis of pterygium and normal conjunctival tissue samples detected by gene microarray,16 differential genes were up-regulated and 9 differential genes were down-regulated,4 differential miRNAs were up-regulated and 3 differential miRNAs were down-regulated.After importing 7 differential miRNAs into miRDB database,1025 target genes were predicted.After importing differential genes and differential miRNAs into Cytoscape software,7 core genes and the top 18 target genes with the highest connectivity were finally obtained.The Genes with differences and the top 18 target Genes with connectivity were imported into David software for GO(Gene Ontology)functional enrichment analysis and KEGG(Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes)pathway enrichment analysis.The GO function enrichment analysis results of differential genes mainly included the regulation of fibroblast proliferation and the activity of transcription factors,etc.,and the signaling pathway enrichment analysis results mainly included the interaction of ECM receptor and PI3K-Akt signaling pathway.The GO function enrichment analysis results of target genes included the regulation of transcription and cell proliferation.KEGG pathways are mainly enriched in cancer pathways and MAPK signaling pathways.The miR-142-5p in differential miRNAs regulated most of the core target genes.Therefore,we selected miR-142-5p in differential miRNAs for qRT-PCR verification,and the results were the same as the results of gene chip detection,indicating that the results of miRNA-chip analysis were reliable.CONCLUSIONS: The differential miRNAs and differential genes can be screened by microarray and the biological function analysis can be performed to find the genes and miRNAs related to pterygium,such as EGR1 gene and Fos gene.miR-142-5p may be involved in the molecular mechanism of pterygium.