Bioinformatics Analyses Determined the Distinct CNS and Peripheral Surrogate Biomarker Candidates between Two Mouse Models for Progressive Multiple Sclerosis

Previously, we have established two distinct progressive multiple sclerosis (MS) models by induction of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) with myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein (MOG) in two mouse strains. A.SW mice develop ataxia with antibody deposition, but no T cell infiltration, in the central nervous system (CNS), while SJL/J mice develop paralysis with CNS T cell infiltration. In this study, we determined biomarkers contributing to the heterogeneities of the two models. Using the CNS and spleen microarray transcriptome and cytokine data, we conducted computational supervised analyses (volcano plot, heat map, and pathway analysis) and unsupervised principal component analysis (PCA) with pattern matching analysis (PMA). Mice with primary progressive experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (PP-EAE) were induced by sensitization with myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein (MOG) alone or MOG and cardlan. Microarray analysis was conducted using brain and spleen samples collected from PP-EAE mice at the disease peak. Microarray data were analyzed by bioinformatics methods, e.g. principal component analysis (PCA).