Identification of the Genetic Influence of SARS-CoV-2 Infections on IgA Nephropathy Based on Bioinformatics Method

Coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection. It was initially detected in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. In March 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared COVID-19 a global pandemic. Compared to healthy individuals, patients with IgA nephropathy (IgAN) are at a higher risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection. However, the potential mechanisms remain unclear. This study explores the underlying molecular mechanisms and therapeutic agents for the management of IgAN and COVID-19 using the bioinformatics and system biology way.

We first downloaded GSE73953 and GSE164805 from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database to obtain common differentially expressed genes (DEGs). Then, we performed the functional enrichment analysis, pathway analysis, protein-protein interaction (PPI) analysis, gene regulatory networks analysis, and potential drug analysis on these common DEGs.

We acquired 312 common DEGs from the IgAN and COVID-19 datasets and used various bioinformatics tools and statistical analyses to construct the PPI network to extract hub genes. Besides, we performed gene ontology (GO) and pathway analyses to reveal the common correlation between IgAN and COVID-19. Finally, on the basis of common DEGs, we determined the interactions between DEGs-miRNAs, the transcription factor-genes (TFs-genes), protein-drug, and gene-disease networks.

We successfully identified hub genes that may act as biomarkers of COVID-19 and IgAN and also screened out some potential drugs to provide new ideas for COVID-19 and IgAN treatment.