scholarly journals HAHmiR.DB: a server platform for high-altitude human miRNA–gene coregulatory networks and associated regulatory circuits

Database ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pankaj Khurana ◽  
Apoorv Gupta ◽  
Ragumani Sugadev ◽  
Yogendra Kumar Sharma ◽  
Bhuvnesh Kumar

Abstract Around 140 million people live in high-altitude (HA) conditions! and even a larger number visit such places for tourism, adventure-seeking or sports training. Rapid ascent to HA can cause severe damage to the body organs and may lead to many fatal disorders. During induction to HA, human body undergoes various physiological, biochemical, hematological and molecular changes to adapt to the extreme environmental conditions. Several literature references hint that gene-expression-regulation and regulatory molecules like miRNAs and transcription factors (TFs) control adaptive responses during HA stress. These biomolecules are known to interact in a complex combinatorial manner to fine-tune the gene expression and help in controlling the molecular responses during this stress and ultimately help in acclimatization. High-Altitude Human miRNA Database (HAHmiR.DB) is a unique, comprehensive and curated collection of miRNAs that have been experimentally validated to be associated with HA stress, their level of expression in different altitudes, fold change, experiment duration, biomarker association, disease and drug association, tissue-specific expression level, Gene Ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopaedia of Gene and Genomes (KEGG) pathway associations. As a server platform, it also uniquely constructs and analyses interactive miRNA–TF–gene coregulatory networks and extracts regulatory circuits/feed-forward loops (FFLs). These regulatory circuits help to offer mechanistic insights into complex regulatory mechanisms during HA stress. The server can also build these regulatory networks between two and more miRNAs of the database and also identify the regulatory circuits from this network. Hence, HAHmiR.DB is the first-of-its-kind database in HA research, which is a reliable platform to explore, compare, analyse and retrieve miRNAs associated with HA stress, their coregulatory networks and FFL regulatory-circuits. HAHmiR.DB is freely accessible at http://www.hahmirdb.in

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Apoorv Gupta ◽  
Ragumani Sugadev ◽  
Yogendra Kumar Sharma ◽  
Bhuvnesh Kumar ◽  
Pankaj Khurana

AbstractRapid ascent to High Altitude (HA) can cause severe damage to body organs and may lead to many fatal disorders. During induction to HA, human body undergoes various physiological, biochemical, hematological and molecular changes to adapt to the extreme environmental conditions. Many literature references hint that gene-expression-regulation and regulatory molecules like microRNAs (miRNAs) and Transcription Factors (TFs) control adaptive responses during HA-stress. These biomolecules are known to interact in a complex combinatorial manner to fine-tune the gene expression and help in controlling the molecular responses during this stress and ultimately help in acclimatization. HAHmiR.DB (High-Altitude Human miRNA Database) is a unique, comprehensive, curated collection of miRNAs that have been experimentally validated to be associated with HA-stress; their level of expression in different altitudes, fold change, experiment duration, biomarker association, disease and drug association, tissue-specific expression level, Gene Ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopaedia of Gene and Genomes (KEGG) pathway associations. As a server platform it also uniquely constructs and analyses interactive miRNA-TF-Gene coregulatory networks and extracts regulatory-circuits/Feed Forward Loops (FFLs) using in-house scripts. These regulatory circuits help to offer mechanistic insights in complex regulatory mechanisms during HA stress. The server can also build these regulatory networks between two and more miRNAs of the database and also identify the regulatory-circuits from this network. Hence HAHmiR.DB is the first-of its-kind database in HA research which a reliable platform to explore, compare, analyse and retrieve miRNAs associated with HA stress, their coregulatory networks and FFL regulatory circuits. HAHmiR.DB is freely accessible at http://www.hahmirdb.in


PeerJ ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. e5951 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruijiang Li ◽  
Hebing Chen ◽  
Shuai Jiang ◽  
Wanying Li ◽  
Hao Li ◽  
...  

Transcription factors (TFs) and microRNAs (miRNAs) are well-characterized trans-acting essential players in gene expression regulation. Growing evidence indicates that TFs and miRNAs can work cooperatively, and their dysregulation has been associated with many diseases including cancer. A unified picture of regulatory interactions of these regulators and their joint target genes would shed light on cancer studies. Although online resources developed to support probing of TF-gene and miRNA-gene interactions are available, online applications for miRNA-TF co-regulatory analysis, especially with a focus on cancers, are lacking. In light of this, we developed a web tool, namely CMTCN (freely available at http://www.cbportal.org/CMTCN), which constructs miRNA-TF co-regulatory networks and conducts comprehensive analyses within the context of particular cancer types. With its user-friendly provision of topological and functional analyses, CMTCN promises to be a reliable and indispensable web tool for biomedical studies.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Logan J. Everett ◽  
Wen Huang ◽  
Shanshan Zhou ◽  
Mary Anna Carbone ◽  
Richard F. Lyman ◽  
...  

SummaryA major challenge in modern biology is to understand how naturally occurring variation in DNA sequences affects complex organismal traits through networks of intermediate molecular phenotypes. Here, we performed deep RNA sequencing of 200 Drosophila Genetic Reference Panel inbred lines with complete genome sequences, and mapped expression quantitative trait loci for annotated genes, novel transcribed regions (most of which are long noncoding RNAs), transposable elements and microbial species. We identified host variants that affect expression of transposable elements, independent of their copy number, as well as microbiome composition. We constructed sex-specific expression quantitative trait locus regulatory networks. These networks are enriched for novel transcribed regions and target genes in heterochromatin and euchromatic regions of reduced recombination, and genes regulating transposable element expression. This study provides new insights regarding the role of natural genetic variation in regulating gene expression and generates testable hypotheses for future functional analyses.


2008 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Etain A. Tansey

Many pathological conditions exist where tissues exhibit hypoxia or low oxygen tension. Hypoxic hypoxia arises when there is a reduction in the amount of oxygen entering the blood and occurs in healthy people at high altitude. In 1946, research sponsored by the United States Navy led to the collection and subsequent publication of masses of data demonstrating the physiological consequences and adaptations of ascent to high altitude. This article describes how a figure from a 1947 paper from the American Physiological Society Legacy collection (Houston CS, Riley RL. Respiratory and circulatory changes during acclimatization to high altitude. Am J Physiol 149: 565–588) may be used to allow students to review their understanding of some of the generalized effects of hypoxia on the body. In particular, this figure summarizes some of the adaptive responses that take place in the oxygen transport system as a consequence of prolonged hypoxia.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Viren Amin ◽  
Murat Can Cobanoglu

AbstractWe present EPEE (Effector and Perturbation Estimation Engine), a method for differential analysis of transcription factor (TF) activity from gene expression data. EPEE addresses two principal challenges in the field, namely incorporating context-specific TF-gene regulatory networks, and accounting for the fact that TF activity inference is intrinsically coupled for all TFs that share targets. Our validations in well-studied immune and cancer contexts show that addressing the overlap challenge and using state-of-the-art regulatory networks enable EPEE to consistently produce accurate results. (Accessible at: https://github.com/Cobanoglu-Lab/EPEE)


ExRNA ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
P. Khurana ◽  
A. Gupta ◽  
R. Sugadev ◽  
Y. K. Sharma ◽  
R. Varshney ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Given the worldwide spread of the novel Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (nSARS-CoV-2) infection pandemic situation, research to repurpose drugs, identify novel drug targets, vaccine candidates have created a new race to curb the disease. While the molecular signature of nSARS-CoV-2 is still under investigation, growing literature shows similarity among nSARS-CoV-2, pulmonary edema, and thromboembolic disorders due to common symptomatic features. A network medicine approach is used to to explore the molecular complexity of the disease and to uncover common molecular trajectories of edema and thrombosis with nSARS-CoV-2. Results and conclusion A comprehensive nSARS-CoV-2 responsive miRNA: Transcription Factor (TF): gene co-regulatory network was built using host-responsive miRNAs and it’s associated tripartite, Feed-Forward Loops (FFLs) regulatory circuits were identified. These regulatory circuits regulate signaling pathways like virus endocytosis, viral replication, inflammatory response, pulmonary vascularization, cell cycle control, virus spike protein stabilization, antigen presentation, etc. A unique miRNA-gene regulatory circuit containing a consortium of four hub FFL motifs is proposed to regulate the virus-endocytosis and antigen-presentation signaling pathways. These regulatory circuits also suggest potential correlations/similarity in the molecular mechanisms during nSARS-CoV-2 infection, pulmonary diseases and thromboembolic disorders and thus could pave way for repurposing of drugs. Some important miRNAs and genes have also been proposed as potential candidate markers. A detailed molecular snapshot of TGF signaling as the common pathway, that could play an important role in controlling common pathophysiologies among diseases, is also put forth.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roy Oelen ◽  
Dylan H. de Vries ◽  
Harm Brugge ◽  
Gracie Gordon ◽  
Martijn Vochteloo ◽  
...  

Gene expression and its regulation can be context-dependent. To dissect this, using samples from 120 individuals, we single-cell RNA-sequenced 1.3M peripheral blood mononuclear cells exposed to three different pathogens at two time points or left unexposed. This revealed thousands of cell type-specific expression changes (eQTLs) and pathogen-induced expression changes (response QTLs) that are influenced by genetic variation. In monocytes, the strongest responder to pathogen stimulations, genetics also affected co-expression of 71.4% of these eQTL genes. For example, the pathogen recognition receptor CLEC12A showed many such co-expression interactions, but only in monocytes after 3h pathogen stimulation. Further analysis linked this to interferon-regulating transcription factors, a finding that we recapitulated in an independent cohort of patients with systemic lupus erythematosus, a condition characterized by increased interferon activity. Altogether, this study highlights the importance of context for gaining a better understanding of the mechanisms of gene regulation in health and disease.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Masayo Inoue ◽  
Kunihiko Kaneko

Living organisms must respond to environmental changes. Generally, accurate and rapid responses are provided by simple, unidirectional networks that connect inputs with outputs. Besides accuracy and speed, however, biological responses should also be robust to environmental or intracellular noise and mutations. Furthermore, cells must also respond to unforeseen environmental changes that have not previously been experienced, to avoid extinction prior to the evolutionary rewiring of their networks, which takes numerous generations. To address the question how cells can make robust adaptation even to unforeseen challenges, we have investigated gene regulatory networks that mutually activate or inhibit, and have demonstrated that complex entangled networks can make appropriate input-output relationships that satisfy such adaptive responses. Such entangled networks function when the expression of each gene shows sloppy and unreliable responses with low Hill coefficient reactions. To compensate for such sloppiness, several detours in the regulatory network exist. By taking advantage of the averaging over such detours, the network shows a higher robustness to environmental and intracellular noise as well as to mutations in the network, when compared to simple unidirectional circuits. Furthermore, it is demonstrated that the appropriate response to unforeseen environmental changes, allowing for functional outputs, is achieved as many genes exhibit similar dynamic expression responses, irrespective of inputs including unforeseen inputs. The similarity of the responses is statistically confirmed by applying dynamic time warping and dynamic mode decomposition methods. As complex entangled networks are commonly observed in the data in gene regulatory networks whereas global gene expression responses are measured in transcriptome analysis in microbial experiments, the present results give an answer how cells make adaptive responses and also provide a novel design principle for cellular networks.Author summaryRecent experimental advances have demonstrated that cells often have appropriate, robust responses to environmental changes, including those that have not previously been experienced. It is known that accurate and rapid responses can be achieved by simple unidirectional networks that connect straightforwardly input and outputs. However, such responses were not robust to perturbations. Here we have made numerical evolution of gene regulatory networks with mutual activation and inhibitions, and uncovered that complex entangled networks including many feedforward and feedback paths can make robust input-output responses, when each gene expression is not accurate. Remarkably, they make appropriate responses even to unforeseen environmental changes, as are supported by global, correlated responses across genes that are similar for all input signals. The results explain why cells adopt complex gene regulatory networks and exhibit global expression changes, even though they may not be advantageous in terms of their energy cost or response speed. The present results are consistent with the recent experiments on microbial gene expression changes and network analyses. This investigation provides insights into how cells survive fluctuating and unforeseen unpredictable environmental changes, and gives a universal conceptual framework to go beyond the standard picture based on a combination of network motifs.


2021 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 605-617
Author(s):  
Dmitrii S. Bug ◽  
Artem V. Tishkov ◽  
Ivan S. Moiseev ◽  
Natalia V. Petukhova

Untranslated gene regions (UTRs) play an important role in controlling gene expression. 3′-UTRs are primarily targeted by microRNA (miRNA) molecules that form complex gene regulatory networks. Cancer genomes are replete with non-coding mutations, many of which are connected to changes in tumor gene expression that accompany the development of cancer and are associated with resistance to therapy. Therefore, variants that occurred in 3′-UTR under cancer progression should be analysed to predict their phenotypic effect on gene expression, e.g., by evaluating their impact on miRNA target sites. Here, we analyze 3′-UTR variants in DICER1 and DROSHA genes in the context of myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) development. The key features of this analysis include an assessment of both “canonical” and “non-canonical” types of mRNA-miRNA binding and tissue-specific profiling of miRNA interactions with wild-type and mutated genes. As a result, we obtained a list of DICER1 and DROSHA variants likely altering the miRNA sites and, therefore, potentially leading to the observed tissue-specific gene downregulation. All identified variants have low population frequency consistent with their potential association with pathology progression.


Cancers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (20) ◽  
pp. 5201
Author(s):  
Emanuele Vitale ◽  
Mila Gugnoni ◽  
Alessia Ciarrocchi

The control of gene expression at a transcriptional level requires a widespread landscape of regulatory elements. Central to these regulatory circuits are enhancers (ENHs), which are defined as cis-acting DNA elements able to increase the transcription of a target gene in a distance- and orientation-independent manner. ENHs are not independent functional elements but work in a complex and dynamic cooperative network, constituting the building blocks of multimodular domains of gene expression regulation. The information from each of these elements converges on the target promoter, contributing to improving the precision and sharpness of gene modulation. ENHs’ interplay varies in its nature and extent, ranging from an additive to redundant effect depending on contexts. Moving from super-enhancers that drive the high expression levels of identity genes, to shadow-enhancers, whose redundant functions contribute to buffering the variation in gene expression, this review aims to describe the different modalities of ENHs’ interaction and their role in the regulation of complex biological processes like cancer development.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document