Department of Microbiology, Faculty of Science & Technology, University of Central Punjab, Lahore, Pakistan.
Department of Pharmacy, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, Pakistan.
PLoS One. 2023 Sep 27;18(9):e0291332. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0291332. eCollection 2023.
Cytokines play an important role in SARS-CoV-2 infection progression and severity. A number of inflammatory cytokines have been directly associated with disease severity including IL-6 (interleukin-6), IL-10, TNF-α (tumor necrosis factor alpha), IFN-γ (interferon-gamma). Here, in this study, the aim was to better understand the interplay between host immune response mediated by cytokines and severity of SARS-CoV-2 infection by assessing cytokine expression. Therefore, we measured expression levels of a total of 12 genes (IFNA-1, IFN-γ, IL-1α, IL-1β, IL-4, IL-6, IL-7, IL-10, IL-11, IL-13, IL-15, and IL-27) encoding inflammatory, anti-inflammatory and regulatory cytokines using QRT-PCR in hospitalized patients with severe infection compared to mildly infected. IFN-γ was identified as a potent marker of disease severity as indicated previously. Moreover, levels of IL-7 were also found to be partially reduced in patients compared to the healthy controls and linked negatively to disease severity. Identification of these cytokines may be helpful in not only understanding disease pathogenesis but also in better management of the patients after covid infection.
细胞因子在 SARS-CoV-2 感染的进展和严重程度中起着重要作用。许多炎症细胞因子与疾病的严重程度直接相关，包括白细胞介素-6（IL-6）、白细胞介素-10（IL-10）、肿瘤坏死因子-α（TNF-α）、干扰素-γ（IFN-γ）。在这里，在这项研究中，目的是通过评估细胞因子的表达来更好地了解细胞因子介导的宿主免疫反应与 SARS-CoV-2 感染严重程度之间的相互作用。因此，我们使用 QRT-PCR 测量了住院严重感染患者与轻度感染患者相比，总共 12 种基因（IFNA-1、IFN-γ、IL-1α、IL-1β、IL-4、IL-6、IL-7、IL-10、IL-11、IL-13、IL-15 和 IL-27）的表达水平，这些基因编码炎症、抗炎和调节性细胞因子。IFN-γ 被鉴定为疾病严重程度的有力标志物，如前所述。此外，与健康对照组相比，患者的 IL-7 水平也发现部分降低，并且与疾病严重程度呈负相关。鉴定这些细胞因子不仅有助于了解疾病发病机制，还有助于更好地管理新冠病毒感染后的患者。
