Impact of JAK/STAT inhibitors on human monocyte-derived-macrophages stimulated by cigarette smoke extract and lipopolysaccharide

Defining Interactions Between the Genome, Epigenome, and the Environment in Inflammatory Bowel Disease: Progress and Prospects

Recent advances in our understanding of the pathogenesis of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) have highlighted the complex interplay between the genome, the epigenome, and the environment. Despite the exciting advances in genomics that have enabled the identification of over 200 susceptibility loci, these only account for a small proportion of the disease variance and the estimated heritability in IBD. It is likely that gene-environment (GxE) interactions contribute to "missing heritability" and these may act through epigenetic mechanisms. Several environmental factors, such as the microbiome, nutrition, and tobacco smoking, induce alterations in the epigenome of children and adults, which may impact disease susceptibility. Other mechanisms for GxE interactions are also directly pertinent in early life. We discuss a model in which environmental factors imprint disease risk in a window of susceptibility during infancy that may contribute to later disease onset, whereas other elements of the exposome act later in life and contribute directly to the pathogenesis and course of the disease. Understanding the mechanisms underlying GxE interactions may provide the basis for new therapeutic targets or preventative strategies for IBD.

JAK-STAT signaling as an ARDS therapeutic target: Status and future trends

Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is characterized by noncardiogenic pulmonary edema. It has a high mortality rate and lacks effective pharmacotherapy. With the outbreak of COVID-19 worldwide, the mortality of ARDS has increased correspondingly, which makes it urgent to find effective targets and strategies for the treatment of ARDS. Recent clinical trials of Janus kinase (JAK) inhibitors in treating COVID-19-induced ARDS have shown a positive outcome, which makes the Janus kinase/signal transducer and activator of transcription (JAK/STAT) pathway a potential therapeutic target for treating ARDS. Here, we review the complex cause of ARDS, the molecular JAK/STAT pathway involved in ARDS pathology, and the progress that has been made in strategies targeting JAK/STAT to treat ARDS. Specifically, JAK/STAT signaling directly participates in the progression of ARDS or colludes with other pathways to aggravate ARDS. We summarize JAK and STAT inhibitors with ARDS treatment benefits, including inhibitors in clinical trials and preclinical studies and natural products, and discuss the side effects of the current JAK inhibitors to reveal future trends in the design of JAK inhibitors, which will help to develop effective treatment strategies for ARDS in the future.

Exploring the relationship between pyroptosis, infiltrating immune cells and Kawasaki disease with resistance to intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) via bioinformatic analysis

BACKGROUND

Kawasaki disease (KD) is a kind of vasculitis predominantly afflicting children younger than five. Although intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) has been regarded as the first-line therapy, there are some children unresponsive to it, resulting in higher risk of coronary artery aneurysms (CAA), the most severe complication of KD. Pyroptosis is an inflammatory apoptosis, which resembles the traits of IVIG-resistance. Therefore, our research aims to find relationships between KD with IVIG-resistance and pyroptosis, and provide the underlying mechanisms of IVIG-resistance.

METHODS

The transcriptome data of three datasets were downloaded from Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) database. CIBERSORTx and WGCNA were combined to identify the coexpression gene network correlated with the up-regulated immune cells in KD, using differentially expressed genes (DEGs) overlapped in GSE68004 and GSE73461. The key genes in hub module were intersected with pyroptosis-related genes (PRGs). Then KD patients were divided into subgroups according to the expression of remaining genes, along with the construction of risk score (RS) based on the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) regression analysis. Besides, we explored the clinical value of RS between IVIG-responsive and -resistant KD patients in GSE16797. In addition, the biological pathways between subgroups were evaluated using Gene Set Variation Analysis (GSVA).

RESULTS

A total of 4246 DEGs and three immune cells, including Monocytes, M0 macrophage, and neutrophils, were analyzed with P < 0.05 between KD and healthy controls (HCs). The lightcyan module was the hub module based on WGCNA, and only NLRC4, CASP1, CASP4, GSDMD, IL1B and PYCARD in the hub module were overlapped with PRGs. Then KD patients in GSE68004 were stratified into two clusters on the basis of the expression levels of six genes. RS was built with five out of six genes (exclude PYCARD) according to the LASSO analysis, which could differentiate C1 from C2, IVIG-responsive from -resistant KD patients. Besides, the high-risk group (C1) tended to be with increased levels of inflammation, immune responses and infiltration of neutrophils according to the analysis of GSVA and CIBERSORTx.

CONCLUSION

We built a pyroptosis-related RS to evaluate the degree of pyroptosis and infiltrating immune cells in subgroups of KD, and associated it with the responsiveness to IVIG, which might help us to further understand the pathological process during IVIG-nonresponse.