Differential genes expression analysis of invasive aspergillosis: a bioinformatics study based on mRNA/microRNA

Invasive aspergillosis is a severe opportunistic infection with high mortality in immunocompromised patients. Recently, the roles of microRNAs have been taken into consideration in the immune system and inflammatory responses. Using bioinformatics approaches, we aimed to study the microRNAs related to invasive aspergillosis to understand the molecular pathways involved in the disease pathogenesis. Data were extracted from the gene expression omnibus (GEO) database. We proposed 3 differentially expressed genes; S100B, TDRD9 and TMTC1 related to pathogenesis of invasive aspergillosis. Using miRWalk 2.0 predictive tool, microRNAs that targeted the selected genes were identified. The roles of microRNAs were investigated by microRNA target prediction and molecular pathways analysis. The significance of combined expression changes in selected genes was analyzed by ROC curves study. Thirty-three microRNAs were identified as the common regulator of S100B, TDRD9 and TMTC1 genes. Several of them were previously reported in the pathogenesis of fungal infections including miR-132. Predicted microRNAs were involved in innate immune response as well as toll-like receptor signaling. Most of the microRNAs were also linked to platelet activation. The ROC chart in the combination mode of S100B/TMTC1, showed the sensitivity of 95.65 percent and the specificity of 69.23 percent. New approaches are needed for rapid and accurate detection of invasive aspergillosis. Given the pivotal signaling pathways involved, predicted microRNAs can be considered as the potential candidates of the disease diagnosis. Further investigation of the microRNAs expression changes and related pathways would lead to identifying the effective biomarkers for IA detection.