Project description:There is a life-long relationship between rhinovirus (RV) infection and the development and clinical manifestations of asthma. In this study we demonstrate that cultured primary bronchial epithelial cells from adults with asthma (n = 9) show different transcriptional and chromatin responses to RV infection compared to those without asthma (n = 9). Both the number and magnitude of transcriptional and chromatin responses to RV were muted in cells from asthma cases compared to controls. Pathway analysis of the transcriptionally responsive genes revealed enrichments of apoptotic pathways in controls but inflammatory pathways in asthma cases. Using promoter capture Hi-C we tethered regions of RV-responsive chromatin to RV-responsive genes and showed enrichment of these regions and genes at asthma GWAS loci. Taken together, our studies indicate a delayed or prolonged inflammatory state in cells from asthma cases and highlight genes that may contribute to genetic risk for asthma.
Project description:Bronchial Epithelial Cells were isolated processed as described (Chu et al., 2002 and Zhao et al., 2011). The objective of the study was to identify differentially expressed genes between normal control (NC), mild-moderate asmathic (notSA) and severe asthmatic (SA) patients. For demographics data, contact Dr.Sally Wenzel (wenzelse@upmc.edu)
Project description:Asthma bronchiale is an inflammatory disease of the respiratory airways and a major factor of increasing health care costs worldwide. The molecular actors leading to asthma are not fully understood and require further investigation. The aim of this study was to monitor the proteome during asthma development from early inflammatory to late fibrotic stages. A time-course-based ovalbumin (OVA) mouse model was applied to establish an asthma phenotype and the lung proteome was analysed at four time points during asthma development (0 weeks = control, 5 weeks, 8 weeks and 12 weeks of OVA treatment).
Project description:MiRNAs are involved in the pathogenesis of bronchial asthma and are involved in the regulation of airway inflammation, airway remodeling and airway hyperreactivity. In this experiment, we constructed OVA asthma model and identified the differentially expressed miRNAs in asthma and normal models by microarray technology, providing a preliminary basis for future studies on the mechanism of asthma. We used microarrays to detail the global program of gene expression in asthma models and identify miRNAs that are differentially expressed in this process.
Project description:Recently, epigenetic regulation was shown to play an important role in asthma development. In particular, lncRNA, as one of the important epigenetic modifications, has been proved to be related to the pathogenesis of asthma. However, little is known about the lncRNA expression in Th17-mediated neutrophil-predominant asthma. To investigate the potential functions of lncRNA that affect the pathogenesis of Th17-mediated neutrophil-predominant asthma, a Agilent Mouse lncRNA (4*180K,Design ID:049801)Array was used to detect the lncRNA and mRNA profiles of lungs from Th17-mediated neutrophil-predominant asthma mice.
Project description:There is a life-long relationship between rhinovirus (RV) infection and the development and clinical manifestations of asthma. In this study we demonstrate that cultured primary bronchial epithelial cells from adults with asthma (n = 9) show different transcriptional and chromatin responses to RV infection compared to those without asthma (n = 9). Both the number and magnitude of transcriptional and chromatin responses to RV were muted in cells from asthma cases compared to controls. Pathway analysis of the transcriptionally responsive genes revealed enrichments of apoptotic pathways in controls but inflammatory pathways in asthma cases. Using promoter capture Hi-C we tethered regions of RV-responsive chromatin to RV-responsive genes and showed enrichment of these regions and genes at asthma GWAS loci. Taken together, our studies indicate a delayed or prolonged inflammatory state in cells from asthma cases and highlight genes that may contribute to genetic risk for asthma.
Project description:Monocot grass species (Poaceae) express a diverse set of multisubunit RNA polymerase enzymes, including Pol II, Pol IV and Pol V. To better understand this functional diversity, we have charted Pol IV function in the model Brachypodium distachyon. Intriguingly, pol IV null mutations in Poaceae crops disrupt growth, reproductive development and seed set. In order to investigate how Pol IV controls vegetative growth and TE activity in these grasses, we have isolated B. distachyon mutant alleles for Pol IV’s largest subunit, NRPD1. We obtained the germplasm in which to screen for these pol IV mutations from the B. distachyon community's sodium azide (NaN) and T-DNA insertion collections.
Project description:Small RNA sequencing in peripheral blood mononuclear cells from patients with asthma and healthy individual with no respiratory disease