Integrative network analysis of N⁶ methylation-related genes reveal potential therapeutic targets for spinal cord injury

Abstract

The diagnosis of the severity of spinal cord injury (SCI) and the revelation of potential therapeutic targets are crucial for urgent clinical care and improved patient outcomes. Here, we analyzed the overall gene expression data in peripheral blood leukocytes during the acute injury phase collected from Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) and identified six m6A regulators specifically expressed in SCI compared to normal samples. LncRNA-mRNA network analysis identified AKT2/3 and PIK3R1 related to m6A methylation as potential therapeutic targets for SCI and constructed a classifier to identify patients of SCI to assist clinical diagnosis. Moreover, FTO (eraser) and RBMX (reader) were found to be significantly down-regulated in SCI and the functional gene co-expressed with them was found to be involved in the signal transduction of multiple pathways related to nerve injury. Through the construction of the drug-target gene network, eight key genes were identified as drug targets and it was emphasized that fostamatinib can be used as a potential drug for the treatment of SCI. Taken together, our study characterized the pathogenesis and identified a potential therapeutic target of SCI providing theoretical support for the development of precision medicine.

Keywords

• n⁶ methylation
• spinal cord injury
• lncrna
• therapeutic targets
• network analysis