Project description:To explore the cellullar and molecular alteration of human psoriasis, we collected full-thickness skin from the lesion region of 3 patients and the similar region of 3 healthy donors, and submit for single cell RNA sequencing (scRNAseq) with 10x genomics (V3.1). The transcriptional landscape of human psoriasis whole skin provide a unique view of immuno-regulation among skin cell types. 1. "Single cell transcriptional zonation of human psoriasis skin identifies an alternative immunoregulatory axis",<Cell Death Dis.>, 2021 May 6;12(5):450. https://yz-studio.shinyapps.io/shinyapph5ad/ 2. "Integrative single-cell transcriptomic investigation unveils long non-coding RNAs associated with localized cellular inflammation in psoriasis" <Front Immunol>2023 Sep 26:14:1265517. Integrated dataset: 106,675 cells from 11 healthy human skin and 79,887 cells from 9 psoriatic human skin https://yz-studio.shinyapps.io/psoriaticskincellatlas2/
Project description:Herein we demonstrate the efficacy of an unbiased proteomics screening approach for studying protein expression changes in the KC-Tie2 psoriasis mouse model, identifying multiple protein expression changes in the mouse and validating these changes in human psoriasis. KC-Tie2 mouse skin samples (n=3) were compared with littermate controls (n=3) using gel-based fractionation followed by label-free protein expression analysis. 5482 peptides mapping to 1281 proteins were identified and quantitated: 105 proteins exhibited fold-changes ≥2.0 including: stefin A1 (average fold change of 342.4 and an average P = 0.0082; cystatin A, human orthologue); slc25a5 (average fold change of 46.2 and an average P = 0.0318); serpinb3b (average fold change of 35.6 and an average P = 0.0345; serpinB1, human orthologue); and kallikrein related peptidase 6 (average fold change of 4.7 and an average P = 0.2474; KLK6). We independently confirmed mouse gene expression-based increases of selected genes including serpinb3b (17.4-fold, P < 0.0001), KLK6 (9.0-fold, P = 0.002), stefin A1 (7.3-fold; P < 0.001) and slc25A5 (1.5-fold; P = 0.05) using qRT-PCR on a second cohort of animals (n=8). Parallel LC/MS/MS analyses on these same samples verified protein-level increases of 1.3-fold (slc25a5; P < 0.05), 29,000-fold (stefinA1; P < 0.01), 322-fold (KLK6; P < 0.0001) between KC-Tie2 and control mice. To underscore the utility and translatability of our combined approach, we analyzed gene and protein expression levels in psoriasis patient skin and primary keratinocytes vs. healthy controls. Increases in gene expression for slc25a5 (1.8-fold), cystatin A (3.0-fold), KLK6 (5.8-fold) and serpinB1 (76-fold; all P < 0.05) were observed between healthy controls and involved lesional psoriasis skin and primary psoriasis keratinocytes. Moreover slc25a5, cystatin A, KLK6 and serpinB1 protein were all increased in lesional psoriasis skin compared to normal skin. These results highlight the usefulness of preclinical disease models using readily-available mouse skin and demonstrate the utility of proteomic approaches for identifying novel peptides/proteins that are differentially regulated in psoriasis that could serve as sources of auto-antigens or provide novel therapeutic targets for the development of new anti-psoriatic treatments.
Project description:Psoriasis is a chronic inflammatory skin disease characterized by marked proliferation of keratinocytes leading to pronounced epidermal hyperplasia, elongation of rete ridges and hyperkeratosis. The most common form of psoriasis, chronic plaque psoriasis (Psoriasis vulgaris), involves relatively stable occurrence and progression of sharply demarcated lesions, usually on the trunk and extremities, which share a combination of trademark histological features, including tortuous and dilated dermal capillaries, loss of the epidermal granular layer, and accumulation of neutrophils beneath parakeratotic scale. In this study, whole-genome transcriptional profiling was used to characterize gene expression in 4 lesional and uninvolved skin samples obtained from patients with stable chronic plaque psoriasis. Skin mRNA expression was analysed by microarray. Four individuals with chronic plaque psoriasis were enrolled. 6 mm punch biopsies were obtained under local anaesthesia (lidocaine) from uninvolved skin and a target plaque.
Project description:Scalp psoriasis shows a variable clinical spectrum and in many cases poses a great therapeutic challenge. However, it remains unknown whether the immune response of scalp psoriasis differs from understood pathomechanisms of psoriasis on other skin areas. We sought to determine the cellular and mollecular phenotype of scalp psoriasis by performing a comparative analysis of scalp vs skin using lesional and nonlesional samples from 20 Caucasian subjects with untreated moderate to severe psoriasis and significant scalp involvement, and 10 control subjects without psoriasis. Our results suggest that even in the scalp psoriasis is a disease of the inter-follicular skin. The immune mechanisms that mediate scalp psoriasis were found to be similar to those involved in skin psoriasis. However, the magnitude of dysregulation, number of differentially expressed genes, and enrichment of the psoriatic genomic fingerprinting were more prominent in skin lesions. Furthermore, the scalp transcriptome showed increased modulation of several gene-sets, particularly those induced by interferon-gamma, compared with skin psoriasis which was mainly associated with activation of TNFâµ/L-17/IL-22-induced keratinocyte response genes. We also detected differences in expression of gene-sets involving negative regulation, epigenetic regulation, epidermal differentiation, and dendritic cell or Th1/Th17/Th22-related T-cell processes. To define the transcriptomic profile of scalp skin, punch biopsies (6 mm diameter) were obtained from 20 Caucasian patients with untreated moderate to severe psoriasis with significative scalp involvement and 10 control subjects without psoriasis (N). Lesional (LS) samples were isolated from the infiltrated border of a plaque of psoriasis. Non lesional (NL) samples were taken from scalp areas with no visible psoriasis between the infiltrated plaques.
Project description:Development of a suitable mouse model would facilitate the investigation of pathomechanisms underlying human psoriasis and would also assist in development of therapeutic treatments. However, while many psoriasis mouse models have been proposed, no single model recapitulates all features of the human disease, and standardized validation criteria for psoriasis mouse models have not been widely applied. In this study, whole-genome transcriptional profiling is used to compare gene expression patterns manifested by human psoriatic skin lesions with those that occur in five psoriasis mouse models (K5-Tie2, imiquimod, K14-AREG, K5-Stat3C and K5-TGFbeta1). While the cutaneous gene expression profiles associated with each mouse phenotype exhibited statistically significant similarity to the expression profile of psoriasis in humans, each model displayed distinctive sets of similarities and differences in comparison to human psoriasis. For all five models, correspondence to the human disease was strong with respect to genes involved in epidermal development and keratinization. Immune and inflammation-associated gene expression, in contrast, was more variable between models as compared to the human disease. These findings support the value of all five models as research tools, each with identifiable areas of convergence to and divergence from the human disease. Additionally, the approach used in this paper provides an objective and quantitative method for evaluation of proposed mouse models of psoriasis, which can be strategically applied in future studies to score strengths of mouse phenotypes relative to specific aspects of human psoriasis. Global transcriptional profiling was utilized to evaluate the similarity between human psoriasis and the psoriasis-like phenotypes that develop in five mouse models (K5-Tie2, IMQ, K14-AREG, K5-Stat3C, K5-TGFbeta1) Expression patterns associated with mouse phenotypes were evaluated by comparing lesional skin from transgenic or IMQ-treated mice (n = 2-3) with normal skin obtained from control mice (n = 2-3).
Project description:Psoriasis is a chronic inflammatory skin disease characterized by marked proliferation of keratinocytes leading to pronounced epidermal hyperplasia, elongation of rete ridges and hyperkeratosis. The most common form of psoriasis, chronic plaque psoriasis (Psoriasis vulgaris), involves relatively stable occurrence and progression of sharply demarcated lesions, usually on the trunk and extremities, which share a combination of trademark histological features, including tortuous and dilated dermal capillaries, loss of the epidermal granular layer, and accumulation of neutrophils beneath parakeratotic scale. In this study, whole-genome transcriptional profiling was used to characterize gene expression in 4 lesional and uninvolved skin samples obtained from patients with stable chronic plaque psoriasis.Skin mRNA expression was analysed by microarray.
Project description:Scalp psoriasis shows a variable clinical spectrum and in many cases poses a great therapeutic challenge. However, it remains unknown whether the immune response of scalp psoriasis differs from understood pathomechanisms of psoriasis on other skin areas. We sought to determine the cellular and mollecular phenotype of scalp psoriasis by performing a comparative analysis of scalp vs skin using lesional and nonlesional samples from 20 Caucasian subjects with untreated moderate to severe psoriasis and significant scalp involvement, and 10 control subjects without psoriasis. Our results suggest that even in the scalp psoriasis is a disease of the inter-follicular skin. The immune mechanisms that mediate scalp psoriasis were found to be similar to those involved in skin psoriasis. However, the magnitude of dysregulation, number of differentially expressed genes, and enrichment of the psoriatic genomic fingerprinting were more prominent in skin lesions. Furthermore, the scalp transcriptome showed increased modulation of several gene-sets, particularly those induced by interferon-gamma, compared with skin psoriasis which was mainly associated with activation of TNF↵/L-17/IL-22-induced keratinocyte response genes. We also detected differences in expression of gene-sets involving negative regulation, epigenetic regulation, epidermal differentiation, and dendritic cell or Th1/Th17/Th22-related T-cell processes.
Project description:Psoriasis is the most common skin disease in adults. Current experimental and clinical evidences suggested the infiltrating immune cells could target local skin cells and thus induce psoriatic phenotype. However, recent studies indicated the existence of a potential feedback signaling loop from local resident skin cells to infiltrating immune cells. Here, we deconstructed the full-thickness human skins of both healthy donors and patients with psoriasis vulgaris at single cell transcriptional level, and further built a neural-network classifier to evaluate the evolutional conservation of skin cell types between mouse and human. Last, we systematically evaluated the intrinsic and intercellular molecular alterations of each cell type between healthy and psoriatic skin. Cross-checking with psoriasis susceptibility gene loci, cell-type based differential expression, and ligand-receptor communication revealed that the resident psoriatic skin cells including mesenchymal and epidermis cell types, which specifically harbored the target genes of psoriasis susceptibility loci, intensively evoked the expression of major histocompatibility complex (MHC) genes, upregulated interferon (INF), tumor necrosis factor (TNF) signalling and increased cytokine gene expression for primarily aiming the neighboring dendritic cells in psoriasis. The comprehensive exploration and pathological observation of psoriasis patient biopsies proposed an uncovered immunoregulatory axis from skin local resident cells to immune cells, thus provided a novel insight for psoriasis treatment. In addition, we published a user-friendly website to exhibit the transcriptional change of each cell type between healthy and psoriatic human skin.
Project description:Psoriasis is a chronic, debilitating, immune-mediated inflammatory skin disease. As IFN-gamma is involved in many cellular processes, including activation of T cells and dendritic cells (DCs), antigen processing and presentation, cell adhesion and trafficking, and cytokine and chemokine production, IFN-gamma-producing Th1 cells were proposed to be integral to the pathogenesis of psoriasis. Recently, IFN-gamma was shown to enhance IL-23 and IL-1 production by DCs and subsequently induce Th17 cells, important contributors to the inflammatory cascade in psoriasis lesions. To determine if IFN-gamma indeed induces the pathways leading to the development of psoriasis lesions, a single intradermal injection of IFN-gamma was administered to an area of clinically normal, non-lesional skin of psoriasis patients and biopsies were collected 24 hours later. Although there were no visible changes in the skin, IFN-gamma induced molecular and histological features characteristic of psoriasis lesions. IFN-gamma increased a number of differentially expressed genes in the skin, including many chemokines concomitant with an influx of T cells and inflammatory DCs. Furthermore, inflammatory DC products TNF, iNOS, IL-23, and TRAIL were present in IFN-gamma-treated skin. Thus, IFN-gamma, which is significantly elevated in non-lesional skin compared to healthy skin, appears to be a key pathogenic cytokine that can induce the inflammatory cascade in psoriasis. RNA was isolated from whole skin punch biopsies of either healthy or non-lesional psoraisis patients at baseline or 24 hours after placebo or IFN-g injection.
Project description:Single-cell RNA sequencing is transforming how we understand skin immunology, but previous human skin single-cell RNA sequencing data included only a small fraction of inflammatory cells among the overall cell population, such that functional subsets may be difficult to ascertain. We have overcome these obstacles by harvesting inflammatory cells emigrating from a half of 6 mm punch biopsy skin after 48-hour incubation in culture medium without any enzyme, and then analyzing the harvested cells with single-cell RNA sequencing. By this strategy, we obtained single-cell RNA sequencing data of 24,354 cells (leukocytes 46.0%, keratinocytes 49.6%, and melanocytes 2.4%) from 13 human psoriasis skin and 5 healthy volunteer skin. Unsupervised clustering identified NK cells, CD161+ T-cells, CD8+ T-cells, CD4+ T-cells, regulatory T-cells, mature & semimature dendritic cells, melanocytes, and keratinocytes in different layers - S. (Stratum) corneum, S. granulosum, S. spinosum, and S. basale. To understand psoriasis immunopathogenesis at single-cell levels, we compared gene expression between psoriasis cells vs. control cells within each inflammatory cell subtype clusters.