New insight into the development of synpolydactyly caused by expansion of HOXD13 polyalanine based on weighted gene
Xiumin Chen1, Xiaofang Shen2, Tao Yang1
1McKusick-Zhang Center for Genetic Medicine, State Key Laboratory for Complex Severe and Rare Diseases, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, School of Basic Medicine, Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, 100005, China.
Background:
Synpolydactyly (SPD) is mainly caused by mutations of polyalanine expansion (PAE) in the transcription factor gene HOXD13 and the involved cell types and signal pathway are still not clear possible pathways and single-cell expression characteristics of limb bud in HOXD13 PAE mice was analyzed in this study.
Method:
We investigated a previous study of a mouse model with SPD and conducted weighted gene co-expression network analysis (WGCNA) using a single-cell RNA sequencing dataset from limb bud cells of SPD mouse model of HOXD13 + 7A heterozygote.
Results:
Analysis of WGCNA revealed that synpolydactyly-associated Hoxd13 PAEs alter the immune response and osteoclast differentiation, and enhance DNA replication. Bmp4, Hand2, Hoxd12, Lnp, Prrx1, Gmnn, and Cdc6 were found to play potentially key roles in synpolydactyly.
Conclusions:
These findings evaluated the main genes related to SPD with PAE mutations in HOXD13 and advance our understanding of human limb development.
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