Project description:Marek’s disease is a contagious lymphoproliferative disease of chickens and is a unique model of viral oncogenesis. Mapping changes or states over the course of infection for both host and pathogen would have the potential to generate important insights into dynamic host-pathogen interactions. Here we introduced 3’ end enriched RNA-seq as a novel method to study host-pathogen interactions in Marek’s disease virus challenged chicken embryo fibroblasts cells, which allowed accurate profiling of gene expression and alternative polyadenylation sites for host and pathogen simultaneously. We totally identified 476 differentially expressed genes and 437 APA switching genes in host, including switching in tandem 3’ UTRs and switching between coding region and 3’ UTR. Most of these genes were related to innate immunity, apoptosis and metabolism, but two sets of genes overlapped a little suggesting two complementary mechanisms for regulating gene expression during infection. In summary, our results gave a relatively comprehensive insight into dynamic host-pathogen interactions in gene transcription regulation during Marek’s disease virus infection and suggested that 3’ end enriched RNA-seq was a promising method to investigate global host-pathogen interactions.
Project description:Chicken 60-mer oligonucleotide microarray, including 39854 cDNA and ESTs, entire Marek’s disease virus and avian influenza virus genomes, and 150 chicken microRNAs, was developed. Cecal tonsil, ileum, liver and spleen from 6 chickens were selected for hybridization to validate the microarray performance. There are 2886, 2886, 2660, 358, 3208 3355, and 3710 genes significantly expressed between liver and spleen, spleen and cecal tonsil, cecal tonsil and ileum, liver and cecal tonsil, liver and ileum, spleen and ileum at the P<10-7. Number of tissue specific genes for cecal tonsil, ileum, liver and spleen was 95, 71, 535, and 108, respectively with p < 10-7. More than 95% of spots had high SNR (>10). Keywords: characteristics of newly developed microarray using different normal tissue
Project description:Dynamic host-pathogen interactions in pathogen-challenged chicken embryo fibroblasts cells with Marek’s Disease Virus using 3’ end enriched RNA-seq
Project description:Background: Marek’s disease (MD) is a highly contagious, lymphomatous disease of chickens induced by a herpesvirus, Marek’s disease virus (MDV) that is the cause of major annual losses to the poultry industry. MD pathogenesis involves multiple stages including an early cytolytic phase and latency, and transitions between these stages are governed by several host and environmental factors. The success of vaccination strategies has led to the increased virulence of MDV and selective breeding of naturally resistant chickens is seen as a viable alternative. While multiple gene expression studies have been performed in resistant and susceptible populations, little is known about the epigenetic effects of infection. Results: In this study, we investigated temporal chromatin signatures induced by MDV by analyzing early cytolytic and latent phases of infection in the bursa of Fabricius of MD-resistant and –susceptible birds. Major global variations in chromatin marks were observed at different stages of MD in the two lines. Differential H3K27me3 marks were associated with immune-related pathways, such as MAP kinase signaling, focal adhesion and neuroactive ligand receptor interaction, and suggested varying degrees of silencing in response to infection. Immune-related microRNAs, e.g. gga-miR-155 and gga-miR-10b, bore chromatin signatures, which suggested their contribution to MD-susceptibility. Finally, several members of the focal adhesion pathway, e.g. THBS4 and ITGA1, showed marked concordance between gene expression and chromatin marks indicating putative epigenetic regulation in response to MDV infection. Conclusions: Our comprehensive analysis of chromatin signatures, therefore, revealed further clues about the epigenetic effects of MDV infection although further studies are necessary to elucidate the functional implications of the observed variations in histone modifications. Total of 32 samples analyzed; 2 histone modifications - H3K4me3 and H3K27me3 x 2 chicken lines with varying resistance to MD - L63 and L72 x 2 time-points of disease progression - 5 and 10 days post infection x 2 conditions - infected and control x 2 biological replicates