Protein-coding and non-coding RNA expression in whole blood leukocytes during experimental human endotoxemia.

Genome-wide gene expression profiling of whole blood leukocytes during experimental human endotoxemia has been used extensively to model acute systemic host responses. Through technological advances in genomics it has become clear that transcription is not limited to protein-coding regions of the genome. Here, we describe a comprehensive analysis of RNA expression of blood leukocytes in healthy volunteers during experimental human endotoxemia. Whole-blood transcriptional patterns of protein-coding and non-coding RNA molecules were generated by means of the human transcriptome array 2.0 (HTA 2.0) chip. Whole blood of healthy male participants was collected before and 2, 4, 6 and 24 hours after intravenous administration of 2ng/kg Escherichia coli lipopolysaccharide (LPS). The Dutch Central Committee on Research Involving Human Subjects (CCMO) and the Medical Ethics Committee of the Academic Medical Center (AMC), Amsterdam, the Netherlands, approved the study. Title legend: endo_0h, healthy subjects before LPS administration; endo_2h, endo_4h, endo_6h, endo_24h, healthy subjects after 2, 4, 6 and 24 hours LPS administration, respectively; endo_dup_0h, duplicate samples of healthy subjects before LPS administration.