Bioinformatics and system biology approach to identify the influences of SARS-CoV-2 on metabolic unhealthy obese patients

Tengda Huang; Nan Jiang; Yujia Song; Hongyuan Pan; Ao Du; Bingxuan Yu; Xiaoquan Li; Jinyi He; Kefei Yuan; Zhen Wang

doi:10.3389/fmolb.2023.1274463

Bioinformatics and system biology approach to identify the influences of SARS-CoV-2 on metabolic unhealthy obese patients

Front Mol Biosci. 2023 Oct 9:10:1274463. doi: 10.3389/fmolb.2023.1274463. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Tengda Huang^#¹, Nan Jiang^#¹, Yujia Song¹, Hongyuan Pan¹, Ao Du¹, Bingxuan Yu¹, Xiaoquan Li¹, Jinyi He¹, Kefei Yuan¹, Zhen Wang¹

Affiliation

¹ Division of Liver Surgery, Department of General Surgery and Laboratory of Liver Surgery, and State Key Laboratory of Biotherapy, West China Hospital, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Introduction: The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-COV-2) has posed a significant challenge to individuals' health. Increasing evidence shows that patients with metabolic unhealthy obesity (MUO) and COVID-19 have severer complications and higher mortality rate. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying the association between MUO and COVID-19 are poorly understood. Methods: We sought to reveal the relationship between MUO and COVID-19 using bioinformatics and systems biology analysis approaches. Here, two datasets (GSE196822 and GSE152991) were employed to extract differentially expressed genes (DEGs) to identify common hub genes, shared pathways, transcriptional regulatory networks, gene-disease relationship and candidate drugs. Results: Based on the identified 65 common DEGs, the complement-related pathways and neutrophil degranulation-related functions are found to be mainly affected. The hub genes, which included SPI1, CD163, C1QB, SIGLEC1, C1QA, ITGAM, CD14, FCGR1A, VSIG4 and C1QC, were identified. From the interaction network analysis, 65 transcription factors (TFs) were found to be the regulatory signals. Some infections, inflammation and liver diseases were found to be most coordinated with the hub genes. Importantly, Paricalcitol, 3,3',4,4',5-Pentachlorobiphenyl, PD 98059, Medroxyprogesterone acetate, Dexamethasone and Tretinoin HL60 UP have shown possibility as therapeutic agents against COVID-19 and MUO. Conclusion: This study provides new clues and references to treat both COVID-19 and MUO.

Keywords: SARS-CoV-2; differentially expressed genes; drug molecule; gene ontology; gene-disease association; hub gene; metabolic unhealthy obese; protein-protein network (PPI).

Grants and funding

The author(s) declare financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This work was supported by grants from the Natural Science Foundation of China (82370645, 8227064382070644 and 82170621), the National multidisciplinary collaborative diagnosis and treatment capacity building project for major diseases (TJZ202104), the Science and Technology Major Program of Sichuan Province (2022ZDZX0019), 1.3.5 project for disciplines of excellence, West China Hospital, Sichuan University (ZYJC18008, ZYGD22006).