NTU Undergraduates' research April 2014 - Biosciences | Page 12

Nottingham Trent University

Identifying key gene expression and comparing interaction differences in fresh Peripheral
Blood Mononuclear Cells stimulated with Type 1 Diabetic plasma
Kate Barker N0405100

Type 1 diabetes mellitus is caused by the autoimmune destruction of pancreatic β cells; the condition
currently affects around 2.9 million people across the UK. Advances in bioinformatics and systems biology
have made it possible to access vast genomic data that can be used to identify differential gene
expression in specific diseased states. Many genes associated with T1D susceptibility have been found by
genomic experiments; only a few however have investigated the protein-protein interactions of the
individual genes. In this project an Artificial Neural Network with a Back propagation algorithm was
applied to a dataset experimentally derived by Wang et al. Gene expression was induced and measured
in PBMCs cultured with plasma from both RO T1D and healthy controls, the interactions between specific
gene targets was also compared by analysing visualisation maps developed from Cytoscape software. The
genes FBP2, Hs.658733 and BHLHE41 displayed the highest level of expression and thus had the greatest
predictability for RO T1D. BHLHE41, ALDOB, UBE2DNL and INA had high expression levels and multiple
interactions in the RO T1D plasma, but nothing of note in the other conditions, these genes may
therefore have some therapeutic potential.