A transcriptomic analysis of acute hepatotoxicity induced by aristolochic acid Ⅰ in mice / 临床肝胆病杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To investigate the molecular mechanism of aristolochic acid Ⅰ (AAⅠ) inducing acute hepatotoxicity in mice. Methods A total of 15 male C57BL/6 mice were randomly divided into normal group with 6 mice and treatment group with 9 mice. The mice in the treatment group were given intraperitoneal injection of AAⅠ at a dose of 20 mg/kg for 5 consecutive days and were sacrificed to collect samples on day 6. The serum levels of alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) were measured, and HE staining was used to observe liver histological changes; three liver tissue samples were randomly selected from each group, and RNA was extracted for high-throughput transcriptome sequencing. Bioinformatics analysis and functional prediction were used to screen out differentially expressed genes, and quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) was used for validation. The t -test was used for comparison of continuous data between two groups. Results Compared with the normal group, the treatment group had significant increases in the activities of ALT and AST ( t =4.331 and 4.947, both P 2 and P < 0.05, among which there were 703 upregulated genes and 649 downregulated genes. The GO and KEGG enrichment analyses of these differentially expressed genes showed significant enrichment in GO terms (such as small molecular catabolism, immune response involving neutrophils, cytoplasmic vesicle lumen in secretory granules, cytoplasmic vesicle lumen, extracellular structural organization, and extracellular matrix) and KEGG pathways (such as chemical carcinogenesis, retinol metabolism, arachidonic acid metabolism, steroid hormone biosynthesis, transcriptional dysregulation in cancer, protein digestion and absorption, regulation of TRP channel by inflammatory mediators, drug metabolism, complement and coagulation cascade, glutathione metabolism, and the PPAR signaling pathway). A cluster analysis ( P < 0.05) showed that significantly downregulated genes included Srd5a1, Lipc, Aqp8, Hba-a1, Slco1a1, and Pklr, which were validated by qRT-PCR (all P < 0.05). Conclusion AA Ⅰ can lead to significant acute hepatotoxicity, which mainly involves the processes such as chemical carcinogenesis, retinol metabolism, arachidonic acid metabolism, steroid hormone biosynthesis, and transcriptional dysregulation in cancer.