Identification of hub genes and networks in cisplatin-induced acute kidney injury

Acute kidney injury induced by cisplatin poses a serious health hazard to patients. Thus, this study was undertaken to elucidate key signaling pathways and hub genes relevant for therapeutic intervention involved in cisplatin-induced acute kidney injury(CI-AKI) by bioinformatics. We identified differentially expressed genes(DEGs) by R language on GSE106993 and GSE153625 datasets, downloaded from Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO). GO enrichment analysis and KEGG analysis were used to identify the main functions of common differential genes. The STRING database was used to construct protein-protein interaction (PPI) networks and hub genes were selected by Cytoscape. TransmiR v2.0 database and miRWalk2.0 database were used to construct transcription factor (TF)/microRNA (miRNA)/mRNA networks. Chinese herbal medicines targeting hub genes were screened by the ETMC database. 817 up-regulated genes and 769 down-regulated genes were obtained in CI-AKI model. Tumor necrosis factor(TNF) signaling pathway, P53 signaling, and metabolic signaling pathway are important pathways in CI-AKI. 8 hub genes were identified through PPI (Trp53、Egf、Stat3、Jun、Casp3、Cdh1、Ptgs2、Cat). We also constructed TF/microRNA/mRNA regulatory networks, including 2 TFs, 4 miRNAs and 214 mRNAs. The results of ETMC database analysis showed that Sang-Ye and Ban-Xia could be used for the treatment of CI-AKI. In this study, we identified 8 hub genes and 3 important signaling pathways in CI-AKI model by bioinformatics analysis, which provide targets for the treatment of CI-AKI. And the two Chinese herbal medicines obtained from our research, Sang-Ye and Ban-Xia, are expected to be used for the treatment of CI-AKI. Meanwhile, the TF/miRNA/mRNA networks we constructed are helpful to the further study of the mechanism of CI-AKI.