Transcriptional response to interferon beta-1a treatment in patients with secondary progressive multiple sclerosis

Interferon (IFN) beta-1a is an approved treatment for relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis (RRMS) and has been examined for use in secondary progressive multiple sclerosis (SPMS). However, no information regarding blood transcriptional changes induced by IFN treatment in SPMS patients is available. Our aim was to identify a subgroup of SPMS patients presenting a gene expression signature similar to that of RRMS patients who are clinical responders to IFN treatment. SPMS patients (n=50, 20 IFN treated and 30 untreated) were classified using unsupervised hierarchical clustering according to IFN inducible gene expression profile identified in RRMS clinical responders to treatment. IFN inducible gene expression profile was determined by finding differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between IFN treated (n=10) and untreated (n=25) RRMS patients.

干扰素β-1a（Interferon (IFN) beta-1a）是获批用于复发缓解型多发性硬化（relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis, RRMS）的治疗药物，同时也曾被探索用于继发进展型多发性硬化（secondary progressive multiple sclerosis, SPMS）的临床治疗。然而，目前尚无关于干扰素治疗对SPMS患者血液转录组诱导改变的相关研究数据。本研究旨在筛选出一类SPMS患者亚群，其基因表达特征与对干扰素治疗具有临床应答的RRMS患者高度相似。本研究共纳入50例SPMS患者，其中20例接受干扰素治疗，30例未接受治疗；研究人员基于在对治疗具有临床应答的RRMS患者中鉴定得到的干扰素诱导基因表达谱，通过无监督层级聚类（unsupervised hierarchical clustering）对入组SPMS患者进行分组。该干扰素诱导基因表达谱的确定，通过对比10例接受干扰素治疗与25例未接受治疗的RRMS患者之间的差异表达基因（differentially expressed genes, DEGs）完成。