Renal transcriptome profiles from mice infected with Leptospira spp.

Leptospirosis caused by pathogenic Leptospira spp. leads to kidney damage that may progress to chronic kidney disease. However, how leptospiral infections lead to renal damage is unclear. Here, we apply microarray platforms to determine the murine renal transcriptome-wide investigation of gene expression changes and biological pathways associated with leptospiral infection-related kidney damage. The aims of this study are to investigate a global analysis of renal gene expression associated with renal damage that was induced by leptospiral infection using experimental murine models. The result of microarray analysis showed that 467 and 927 genes to be differentially expressed in mice kidney with pathogenic leptospiral infection after day 7 and 28, respectively. Moreover, the result also showed that the 508 significantly differentially expressed genes in the kidneys of mice after infection with non-pathogenic leptospires at 7 days post-infection, and the 1,067 transcripts significantly differentially expressed in these kidneys at 28 days post-infection. Biological pathways performed using KEGG pathway enrichment analysis (P-value < 1E-5) showed that a total of 6 and 7 pathways were significantly enriched at 7 and 28 days post-infection with pathogenic leptospires, respectively. A total of 25 pathways were significantly enriched at day 28 following the non-pathogenic leptospiral infection. However, none of pathways were found in microarray data at day 7 post-infection with non-pathogenic leptospires. In addition, the antigen processing and presentation pathways was significantly enriched at 7 and 28 days post-infection with pathogenic leptospires, and at day 28 following the non-pathogenic leptospiral infection. C57BL/6 female mice were inoculated using intraperitoneal challenge with a high infective dose of L. interrogans serovar Copenhageni Fiocruz L1-130 (ATCC number BAA-1198) and L. biflexa serovar Patoc (ATCC number 23582) , respectively. The control groups were inoculated with sterile EMJH medium . The mice were sacrificed at 7 and 28 days post-infection, and the kidneys were harvested. Total RNA was extracted from kidneys and subjected to Affymetrix whole genome transcriptomic analysis.