マウス、ラットおよびヒトにおける心臓トランスクリプトームの比較研究

抄録

The heart is a critical organ for maintaining life in mammals and has long been one of the most important targets of scientific research, and the basic molecular mechanisms of heart beat appear to have already been established. However, few studies have focused on species differences, and challenges remain in studying genes that have universal functions across species and genes that determine species differences. Here, we analyzed transcriptome data from mouse, rat, and human atria, ventricles, and sinus node (SA) and calculated and compared specificity measure (SPM) values that account for species differences among the three cardiac regions. SA has the largest species differences and we searched for a gene, which by our criteria was SHOX2; the SPM value for SHOX2 was prominently high across species. Similarly, SPM values identified 3 atrial-specific markers, 11 ventricular-specific markers, and 17 SA-specific markers. Ontology analysis identified 70 cardiac region- and species-specific ontologies. These results suggest that reanalysis of existing data by calculating SPM values may identify novel tissue-specific and species-dependent gene expression. This study demonstrates that SHOX2 is an SA-specific transcription factor, a novel cardiac region marker, and that species-dependent ontology is important. No COI.