Preliminary transcriptome profiling reveals RUFY1, ABCC3 and DNAJC7 genes are significantly dysregulated among hepatitis B virus-induced hepatocellular carcinoma patients in Nigeria.

Chronic hepatitis B (CHB) infection affects about 20 million Nigerians and its most fatal complication is hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) which lacks sensitive and specific diagnostic markers for detection at a very early stage. Consequently, this study assessed dysregulated genes across the clinical spectrum of HBV infection as potential non-invasive biomarkers of early-stage HCC. The total RNA from the peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) of 75 nucleoside analog and chemotherapy naïve patients was extracted. The mRNA libraries were constructed, sequenced using the Illumina sequencing platform followed by bioinformatic analysis for differential gene expression and gene ontology studies using the GALAXY pipeline, Qiagen ingenuity pathway and DAVID pipeline. Transcriptome analysis of the PBMC identified 66,726 genes and transcripts. Among patients with HBV-induced HCC vs Chronic asymptomatic hepatitis B (CHB) cohort, 3,204 genes were differentially expressed with 76 and 272 genes significantly upregulated and downregulated, respectively. Across the clinical cohorts of HBV-induced HCC vs healthy controls, 4561 were dysregulated with 370 and 375 genes significantly upregulated and downregulated, respectively. This study evluated the differential gene expression across clinical cohorts of patients with chronic HBV infection, HBV-induced hepatocellular carcinoma and healthy controls. The RUFY1, ABCC3 and DNAJC7 genes were significantly dysregulated