Gene Expression Data for the study of the Interaction of Uteroplacental Insufficiency and Postnatal Western Diet on the Hepatic Transcriptome in Young Adult Female and Male Guinea Pigs

We explored the hypothesis that gene expression will be dysregulated in the liver of low birth weight (LBW) offspring, distinct from normal birth weight (NBW) offspring, in young adulthood when both birth weight outcomes are challenged with a lifelong postnatal Western diet (WD). Independent of diet, in LBW vs. NBW males, 7 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified, most of which downregulated (5 vs. 2) in LBW males. A similar trend was observed in LBW vs. NBW females, where 12 DEGs were identified, predominantly downregulated in the LBW group (9 vs. 3), irrespective of diet. Lifelong WD consumption exerted a marked influence on liver transcription profiles. Notably, 553 (444 upregulated and 109 downregulated) and 639 (533 upregulated and 106 downregulated) DEGs were identified in males and females, independent of birth weight, respectively. Additionally, in females, birth weight and WD both impacted six genes. Further, transcriptomic analysis revealed 22 (9 upregulated and 13 downregulated) and 55 (12 upregulated and 43 downregulated) DEGs between LBW/WD and NBW/WD groups in males and females, respectively. A whole-Transcript Expression Analysis Gene Titan was conducted (Genome Québec Innovation Centre, QU, Canada) on guinea pig livers of 5 NBW/CD males, 5 LBW/CD males, 5 NBW/WD males, 5 LBW/WD males, 5 NBW/CD females, 5 LBW/CD females, 3 NBW/WD males, and 5 LBW/WD females. The microarray .CEL files were imported into the Transcriptome Analysis Console (TAC) (version 4.0) (Life Technologies, Carlsbad, CA) and the raw data normalized using the Robust Multiple-Array Averaging (RMA) method. Differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified using the TAC Expression (Gene) analysis method, following the TAC user guide. Two-way ANOVA and customized comparisons in TAC software were performed to determine the main effect of birth weight and diet, and to compare LBW and NBW within each diet, respectively. To determine the significance of DEGs, a cut-off for the fold change value ± 2 and p-value < 0.05 was applied.