New Marker for Biliary Artresia Identified

Biliary artresia is a congenital disease, leading to blockage in tubes carrying bile fluid from liver to gall bladder. Researchers have identified RRAS gene and its related MAPK pathway that play a vital role in the pathogenesis of BA, and serves as a novel prognostic marker for BA. BA leads to progressive fibrosis and cirrhosis. Microarray technology, emerged as an indispensable research tool for gene expression profiling, has been used to study the mechanism underlying BA, and allows the simultaneous analysis of thousands of transcripts within a single experiment. Some studies have been performed to investigate the gene expression profiling of livers from BA patients. However, none of them was designed to identify genes that play a key role in the pathogenesis and prognosis of BA. A research article to be published on February 14, 2011 in the World Journal of Gastroenterology addresses this question. In this study, DNA microarrays for whole genome gene expression and bioinformatics analysis were used to characterize the differentially expressed gene patterns of normal livers and livers from BA patients at different ages, as well as to ascertain the genes and pathways that play a central role in the pathogenesis of BA. Furthermore, reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction was performed to confirm the changes in selected genes. The relation between selected gene expression and prognosis of BA patients was also analyzed.

The results showed autoimmune response mediated by T lymphocytes may play a vital role in the pathogenesis of BA.

By identifying genes and pathways playing a central role in the pathogenesis of BA, this study may represent a future strategy for therapeutic intervention in treatment of BA.

Source-Eurekalert