Background: Chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS) is a disease of the sinuses with two phenotypes, with nasal polyposis (CRSwNP) and without (CRSsNP). Phenotypes do not explain the variability of the disease, the global distribution of its endotypes, or the response to therapy. Knowledge of different inflammatory mechanisms obtained through transcriptome can help explain the development of the disease.
Methods: The study was designed as a prospective cohort study of patients with an apparent primary CRS. The control group consisted of patients with healthy nasal mucosa. RNA was extracted and assessed for purity and integrity. RNA sequencing (RNAseq) was performed on an Illumina NovaSeq6000 platform. The analysis included the removal of low-quality reads, adapter removal, alignment with the reference sequence, and normalization of reads. Functional analyses included the identification of diseases and functions, canonical pathways, and transcriptional regulators.
Results: Transcriptome analysis was performed on samples from 22 subjects with CRSwNP, 11 with CRSsNP, and 15 controls. In tissue samples, we found a high correlation between CRSwNP and CRSsNP (r = 0.637, P < 0.001). However, differences were also observed, with 375 CRSwNP-specific differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and 328 CRSsNP-specific DEGs identified. In addition, we also identified 75 DEGs specific to each phenotype. Enrichment of DEGs shows immune regulation, overall movement, and inflammation as the best-characterized pathway in CRS.
Conclusions: Analysis revealed differences between phenotypes in CRSwNP immune regulation via NF-kβ, Toll-like receptor signaling and signaling, HIF1α regulation, T2-pathway, IL-6 and IL-15 pathways, and recruitment and regulation of various immune cells. NFAT immune response regulation and calcium-induced T cell apoptosis are highly activated in CRSsNP. As well as, high activation of regulators that trigger inflammatory processes regulate immune pathways and known molecules of the innate immune response, which have previously been shown to be involved in KRS, such as bacterial products and T-cell regulators.
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