mRNA sequencing of human osteoarthritis chondrocytes treated with or without autotaxin inhibitor

OBJECTIVE: To identify the changes in gene expression elicted by ATX inhibition in human OA primary chondrocytes. Chondrocytes were obtained from patients undergoing knee artheroplasty, cultured, and treated for 24 h with ATX inhibitor or control (without inhibitor). Total RNA was then extracted, and mRNA libraries were prepared using Illumina's TruSEQ stranded mRNA library preparation kit, pooled together, and sequenced on Illumina's NextSeq550. Overall design: Differential expression analysis was performed on the mRNA-SEQ data obtained from 6 prepared libraries, where 3 were treated with the ATX inhibitor. Subsequent pathway analysis identified pathways related to cholesterol analogue metabolism and cell-cycle that could be modulated by ATX inhibition in human OA chondrocytes.