Expression and regulatory network of long noncoding RNA in rats after spinal cord hemisection injury

Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) participate in a variety of biological processes and diseases. However, the expression and function of lncRNAs after spinal cord injury has not been extensively analyzed. In this study of right side hemisection of the spinal cord at T10, we detected the expression of lncRNAs in the proximal tissue of T10 lamina at different time points and found 445 lncRNAs and 6522 mRNA were differentially expressed. We divided the differentially expressed lncRNAs into 26 expression trends and analyzed Profile 25 and Profile 2, the two expression trends with the most significant difference. Our results showed that the expression of 68 lncRNAs in Profile 25 rose first and remained high 3 days post-injury. There were 387 mRNAs co-expressed with the 68 lncRNAs in Profile 25. The co-expression network showed that the co-expressed genes were mainly enriched in cell division, inflammatory response, FcγR-mediated cell phagocytosis signaling pathway, cell cycle and apoptosis. The expression of 56 lncRNAs in Profile2 first declined and remained low after 3 days post-injury. There were 387 mRNAs co-expressed with the 56 lncRNAs in Profile 2. The co-expression network showed that the co-expressed genes were mainly enriched in the chemical synaptic transmission process and in the signaling pathway of neuroactive ligand-receptor interaction. The results provided the expression and regulatory network of the main lncRNAs after spinal cord injury and clarified their co-expressed gene enriched biological processes and signaling pathways. These findings provide a new direction for the clinical treatment of spinal cord injury.