Department of Anatomy, Embryology and Animal Genetics, Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Enfermedades Neurodegenerativas (CIBERNED), Agroalimentary Institute of Aragon (IA2), Institute of Health Research of Aragon (IIS), University of Zaragoza, Zaragoza, Spain.
Andrology. 2024 Nov;12(8):1887-1896. doi: 10.1111/andr.13624. Epub 2024 Mar 12.
Despite the growing awareness of sexual dimorphism between males and females under pathological and physiological conditions, sex bias in biomedical research in animal models and patients is still present nowadays. The main objective of this work was to investigate sex differences in constitutive long non-coding RNA expression in spinal cord and skeletal muscle from wild-type mice.
To assess the influence of gender on long non-coding RNAs, we extracted RNA from tissues of male and female mice and analyzed the expression on nine long non-coding RNAs, selected for being among the most commonly studied or exerting an important role in muscle, at 50, 60, and 120 days of age.
We observed age- and tissue-dependent significant sex differences, being more prominent in skeletal muscle. We also studied the effect of sex steroid hormones on long non-coding RNA expression in vitro, noticing a modulation of long non-coding RNA levels upon estradiol and dihydrotestosterone treatment in muscle.
Taken together, results obtained evidenced sex differences on constitutive long non-coding RNA expression and suggested an influence of steroid hormones complementary to other possible factors. These findings emphasize the importance of including both sexes in experimental design to minimize any potential sex bias.
尽管在病理和生理条件下，男性和女性之间存在着越来越明显的性别差异，但在动物模型和患者的生物医学研究中，性别偏见仍然存在。本研究的主要目的是研究野生型小鼠脊髓和骨骼肌中组成性长非编码 RNA 表达的性别差异。
为了评估性别对长非编码 RNA 的影响，我们从雄性和雌性小鼠的组织中提取 RNA，并在 50、60 和 120 天时分析 9 种长非编码 RNA 的表达情况，这些 RNA 是根据它们在肌肉中的研究频率或重要性选择的。
我们观察到年龄和组织依赖性的显著性别差异，在骨骼肌中更为明显。我们还研究了性激素对体外长非编码 RNA 表达的影响，发现在肌肉中，雌二醇和二氢睾酮处理会调节长非编码 RNA 的水平。
综上所述，研究结果表明组成性长非编码 RNA 表达存在性别差异，并提示性激素的影响与其他可能的因素互补。这些发现强调了在实验设计中纳入两性以最小化任何潜在性别偏见的重要性。
