Gene expression profile of peripheral blood mononuclear cells from mild and severe COVID-19 patients, severely ill COVID-19 patients treated with dexamethasone and healthy controls

The objective of this experiment was to compare the transcriptomic profile (NanoString platform) of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from COVID-19 patients with mild disease, and patients with severe COVID-19 with and without dexamethasone treatment, and healthy controls. We analyzed PBMCs from 4 mild COVID patients, 3 severe COVID patients,4 severe COVID patients treated with dexamethasone, and 5 healthy controls Total RNA was isolated from the patient and control PBMCs using the E.Z.N.A. total RNA isolation Kit (Omega Bio-tek).We analyzed 100 ng of RNA from four mild, three severe, and four severe COVID-19 patients treated with dexamethasone, along with five unexposed healthy donors using the human Host Response CodeSet panel (NanoString), which includes 773 genes covering the host immune response to infectious diseases, and 12 internal reference genes for data normalization. The RNA samples were hybridized as per the manufacturer’s instructions, and each sample was read in a multiplexed reaction with the reference (positive, negative controls, and housekeeping genes) probes on the NanoString nCounter Flex instrument.