Expression profile of long noncoding RNAs and mRNAs in peripheral blood mononuclear cells from myasthenia gravis patients

For the epigenetic characterization of myasthenia gravis (MG), we determined whether long noncoding RNAs (IncRNAs) and messenger RNAs (mRNAs) are expressed differentially in subjects with and without MG. Compared with healthy control subjects, the MG patients had 1561 upregulated lncRNAs, 1034 downregulated IncRNAs, 921 upregulated mRNAs, and 806 downregulated mRNAs (fold change > 2.0). Several GO terms including nucleic acid transcription factor activity, inflammatory response, regulation of leukocyte activation, lymphocyte proliferation and regulation of B cell proliferation were enriched in gene lists, suggesting a potential correlation with MG. Pathway analysis then demonstrated that cytokine-cytokine receptor interaction, intestinal immune network for IgA production, NOD-like receptor signaling pathway, NF-kappaB signaling pathway, cell adhesion molecules and TNF signaling pathway play important roles in MG. Co-expression network analysis indicated that 33 IncRNAs were predicted to have 31 cis-regulated target genes, and 65 IncRNAs appeared to regulate the patients' 45 trans target genes among differentially expressed IncRNAs. Our present study identified a subset of dysregulated IncRNAs and mRNAs in patients with MG, which may impact this disease process. (C) 2016 Published by Elsevier B.V.