Evaluation of Protein Complexes in Muscular Atrophy Using Interaction Map Analysis

Abstract

Background and purpose: Muscular atrophy is a condition derived from different diseases and aging. Molecular study of the disease condition can help in developing diagnostic methods and treatment approaches. In this study, protein interaction network was analyzed to understand molecular events at protein levels. Materials and methods: In this experimental study, the network was constructed and analyzed using Cytoscape and its plug-in STRING. In addition, Network Analyzer and MCODE were applied to analyze the centrality and clustering, respectively. Bingo explored the gene ontology of the determined protein complexes. Results: The findings showed five key genes in the network of atrophy including AKT1, ALB, DMD, SMN1, and SMN2. Furthermore, six clusters of proteins were obtained from which two significant ones were considered for gene ontology analysis. Conclusion: All the central proteins, AKT1, ALB, DMD, SMN1, and SMN2 are present in the clusters of our interests. It can be concluded that the panel of biomarkers introduced could be of great help in understanding the pathology of muscular atrophy.

Keywords

• atrophy
• protein interaction maps
• protein clusters
• biomarkers