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Updated: Apr 20, 2026
Early Pathological and Magnetic Resonance Detection of Cerebral Injury Using a Rat Model of Neonatal Hypoxic Ischemic Encephalopathy
Published on: October 28, 2022
Detection of hypoxia markers in the cerebellum after a traumatic frontal cortex injury: a human postmortem gene
K Schober1, B Ondruschka, J Dreßler
1German Air Force Center for Aerospace Medicine, Postfach 1264/KFL, 82242, Fürstenfeldbruck, Germany, kristinschober@bundeswehr.org.
Purpose:
The response to traumatic brain injury (TBI) is complex and induces various biological pathways in all brain regions that contribute to bad outcomes. The cerebellar hypoxia after a frontal cortex injury may potentiate the pathophysiological impacts of TBI. Therefore, a gene expression analysis was conducted to determine the influence of hypoxia on TBIs.
Material And Methods:
Total RNA, including microRNAs, was isolated from the cerebellum of individuals who had died from severe frontal cortex injuries or due to natural causes of death (reference group).
Results:
From a total of 19,596 genes, an average of 59.56% messenger RNAs (mRNAs) appeared expressed with 42 of them showing significant >2-fold differences of upregulated (n = 18) and downregulated (n = 24) genes. The validity of 14 candidate genes (with low p values and high fold differences or based on cited literature) was confirmed using qRT-PCR (Spearman correlation r(2) = 0.93). Only four genes appeared to be either upregulated (FOSB and IL6) or downregulated (HSD11B1 and HSPA12B). From a total of 667 microRNAs, altogether, 248 microRNAs appeared expressed with 13 of them showing significant differences in the mean gene expression. The combination of two mRNAs (HSPA12B/FOSB or IL6/HSD11B1) or two microRNAs (either miR-138/miR-744 or miR-195/miR-324-5p) completely discriminated both groups, a finding unaltered by potential confounders such as age at biosampling, survival time, and the postmortem interval.
Conclusions:
Cerebellar hypoxia markers are important to understand the pathophysiology of TBIs and could be used for therapeutic strategies or forensic purposes, e.g., to assess the severity of a brain injury.
