Evidence map›Paper›PMID 40961119›Full record

ArticlePloS one2025

Transcriptomic analysis implicates the involvement of RBM20 in Fuchs' endothelial corneal dystrophy with TCF4 repeat expansion.

Xunzhi Zhang, Ze Yu, Aundrea K Westfall, Kunyi Han, V Vinod Mootha, Chao Xing

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Article in PloS one, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.

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1 · What the graph read from it

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4 · The record

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5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

6 authors.

Xunzhi ZhangEugene McDermott Center for Human Growth and Development, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas, United States of America.
Ze YuEugene McDermott Center for Human Growth and Development, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas, United States of America.ORCID 0000-0002-0583-1351
Aundrea K WestfallEugene McDermott Center for Human Growth and Development, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas, United States of America.
Kunyi HanEugene McDermott Center for Human Growth and Development, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas, United States of America.
V Vinod MoothaEugene McDermott Center for Human Growth and Development, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas, United States of America.
Chao XingEugene McDermott Center for Human Growth and Development, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas, United States of America.ORCID 0000-0002-1838-0502

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

backgroundLate-onset Fuchs' endothelial corneal dystrophy (FECD) is a degenerative disease of cornea manifesting during the fourth decade of life or later. An intronic trinucleotide repeat expansion (CTG18.1) in the transcription factor 4 (TCF4) gene is estimated to account for two thirds of FECD cases. There is a high degree of similarity between the transcriptomic profiles with (RE+) and without (RE-) the expansion. The molecular mechanisms of FECD and the difference between the two FECD types remain to be elucidated.

methodAnalyses were based on publicly available RNA sequencing datasets of human corneal endothelial tissues. We compared the distributions of differentially expressed genes between the RE+ and RE- transcriptomic profiles for a given co-expression network module. Upstream regulator analysis, alternative splicing analysis, motif enrichment analysis, and structure prediction were conducted.

resultsThe expression levels of ribonucleic acid binding motif protein 20 (RBM20) were upregulated in both RE+ cases and RE+ controls. Consistently, its motif was enriched in the skipped exon events of RE+ subjects compared with RE- subjects. There were skipped exon events in three genes-DST, FNBP1 and SORBS1- consistently identified in RE+ subjects out of the documented RBM20 target genes in the literature.

conclusionRBM20 may represent an RE+ specific factor in the pathogenesis of FECD. The increase of RBM20 expression in RE+ individuals may contribute to the disease by repressing the inclusion of exons.

Indexed as

Fuchs' Endothelial DystrophyRNA-Binding ProteinsTranscription Factor 4TranscriptomeTrinucleotide Repeat ExpansionAlternative SplicingGene Expression ProfilingHumansRNA-Binding ProteinsTCF4 protein, humanTranscription Factor 4

Identifiers

PMID40961119
PMCPMC12443318

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