Gene Expression Analysis Reveals Genes Common to Cerebral Malaria and Neurodegenerative Disorders

authors

• Cabantous Sandrine
• Doumbo Ogobara K
• Poudiougou Belco
• Louis Laurence
• Barry Abdoulaye
• Oumar Aboubacar A
• Traore Abdoualye
• Marquet S.
• Dessein Alain

keywords

• Neurodegenerative disorders
• Expression
• MRNA
• PBMCs
• Human
• Common pathways
• Cerebral malaria

abstract

Cerebral malaria, a reversible encephalopathy affecting young children, is a medical emergency requiring urgent clinical assessment and treatment. We performed a whole-transcrip-tomic analysis of blood samples from Malian children with cerebral or uncomplicated malaria. We focused on transcripts from pathways for which dysfunction has been associated with neurodegenerative disorders. We found that SNCA, SIAH2, UBB, HSPA1A, TUBB2A, and PINK1 were upregulated (fold-increases , ≥2.6), whereas UBD and PSMC5 were downregulated (fold-decreases, ≤4.39) in children with cerebral malaria, compared with those with uncomplicated malaria. These findings provide the first evidence for pathogenic mechanisms common to human cerebral malaria and neurodegenerative disorders.

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