Zhang Jingjing, Zhang Jing, Cong Shengnan, Feng Jingyi, Pan Lianjun, Zhu Yuan, Zhang Aixia, Ma Jiehua
Women's Hospital of Nanjing Medical University (Nanjing Maternity and Child Health Care Hospital), Nanjing, China.
Jiangsu Health Vocational College, Nanjing, China.
PeerJ. 2021 Nov 10;9:e12485. doi: 10.7717/peerj.12485. eCollection 2021.
Vaginal lubrication is a crucial physiological response that occurs at the beginning of sexual arousal. However, research on lubrication disorders (LD) is still in its infancy, and the role of long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) in LD remains unclear. This study aimed to explore the function of lncRNAs in the pathogenesis of vaginal LD.
The expression profiles of LD and normal control (NC) lncRNAs were examined using next-generation sequencing (NGS), and eight selected differentially expressed lncRNAs were verified by quantitative real-time PCR. We conducted GO annotation and KEGG pathway enrichment analyses to determine the principal functions of significantly deregulated genes. LncRNA-mRNA co-expression and protein-protein interaction (PPI) networks were constructed and the lncRNA transcription factors (TFs) were predicted.
From the results, we identified 181,631 lncRNAs and 145,224 mRNAs in vaginal epithelial tissue. Subsequently, our preliminary judgment revealed a total of 499 up-regulated and 337 down-regulated lncRNAs in LD. The top three enriched GO items of the dysregulated lncRNAs included the following significant terms: "contractile fiber part," "actin filament-based process," and "contractile fiber". The most enriched pathways were "cell-extracellular matrix interactions," "muscle contraction," "cell-cell communication," and "cGMP-PKG signaling pathway". Our results also showed that the lncRNA-mRNA co-expression network was a powerful platform for predicting lncRNA functions. We determined the three hub genes, ADCY5, CXCL12, and NMU, using PPI network construction and analysis. A total of 231 TFs were predicted with RHOXF1, SNAI2, ZNF354C and TBX15 were suspected to be involved in the mechanism of LD.
In this study, we constructed the lncRNA-mRNA co-expression network, predicted the lncRNA TFs, and comprehensively analyzed lncRNA expression profiles in LD, providing a basis for future studies on LD clinical biomarkers and therapeutic targets. Further research is also needed to fully determine lncRNA's role in LD development.
阴道润滑是性唤起开始时发生的一种关键生理反应。然而，关于润滑障碍（LD）的研究仍处于起步阶段，长链非编码RNA（lncRNA）在LD中的作用尚不清楚。本研究旨在探讨lncRNA在阴道LD发病机制中的作用。
使用下一代测序（NGS）检测LD和正常对照（NC）lncRNA的表达谱，并通过定量实时PCR验证8个选定的差异表达lncRNA。我们进行了基因本体（GO）注释和京都基因与基因组百科全书（KEGG）通路富集分析，以确定显著失调基因的主要功能。构建lncRNA- mRNA共表达和蛋白质-蛋白质相互作用（PPI）网络，并预测lncRNA转录因子（TF）。
从结果中，我们在阴道上皮组织中鉴定出181,631个lncRNA和145,224个mRNA。随后，我们的初步判断显示，LD中共有499个lncRNA上调和337个lncRNA下调。失调lncRNA的前三个富集GO条目包括以下重要术语：“收缩纤维部分”、“基于肌动蛋白丝的过程”和“收缩纤维”。最富集的通路是“细胞-细胞外基质相互作用”、“肌肉收缩”、“细胞-细胞通讯”和“cGMP-PKG信号通路”。我们的结果还表明，lncRNA-mRNA共表达网络是预测lncRNA功能的强大平台。我们使用PPI网络构建和分析确定了三个枢纽基因，即腺苷酸环化酶5（ADCY5）、趋化因子配体12（CXCL12）和神经介素U（NMU）。共预测了231个TF，怀疑RHOXF家族成员1（RHOXF1）、锌指蛋白SNAI2（SNAI2）、锌指蛋白354C（ZNF354C）和T-框蛋白15（TBX15）参与LD的机制。
在本研究中，我们构建了lncRNA-mRNA共表达网络，预测了lncRNA TF，并全面分析了LD中的lncRNA表达谱，为未来LD临床生物标志物和治疗靶点的研究提供了依据。还需要进一步研究以充分确定lncRNA在LD发展中的作用。
