Transcriptomic analysis of the hypothalamic paraventricular and the arcuate nucleus of NNAT null mice

Neuronatin (Nnat) has previously been reported to be part of a network of imprinted genes. Disruption of neuronatin results in an unusual phenotype of a bimodal body weight.In order to understand at the molecular level how the Nnat deficiency could contribute to the hypervariable phenotypes seen, we performed RNA sequencing from laser-capture micro dissected paraventricular nucleus (PVN) and arcuate nucleus (ARC) and compared the transcriptome between Nnat+/-p mice and their Nnat+/+ littermates in different feeding conditions. We performed an analysis of three subgroups: Nnat+/+ (all non-obese), Nnat+/-p non-obese, and Nnat+/-p obese mice and combined two approaches to identify differences in hypothalamic gene expression between subgroups Gene expression analysis between wild-type and NNAT null mice神经元素（Neuronatin，Nnat）此前已被证实属于印迹基因（imprinted genes）网络的组成部分。神经元素的功能缺失会引发一种罕见的双峰体重表型。为从分子水平解析Nnat缺陷如何导致上述高度可变的表型，我们对激光捕获显微切割（laser-capture microdissected）获取的室旁核（paraventricular nucleus，PVN）与弓状核（arcuate nucleus，ARC）开展了RNA测序（RNA sequencing），并在不同喂养条件下，比较了Nnat+/-p小鼠与其野生型同窝仔鼠的转录组（transcriptome）差异。我们设置了三个亚组进行分析：全为非肥胖个体的Nnat+/+组、Nnat+/-p非肥胖组，以及Nnat+/-p肥胖组，并结合两种分析方法以鉴定各亚组间的下丘脑基因表达差异，以及野生型小鼠与NNAT敲除小鼠的基因表达分析。