In Silico Gene Expression and Pathway Analysis to Explore the Link between Hes1 and Adipocyte Stem Cell Differentiation in Obesity

Aim: Hairy/enhancer of split homolog-1 (Hes1) is a transcription factor with bHLH domains and participates in controlling proliferation and differentiation of various stem cell progenitors. The study aims to analyze pathways and genes up regulated and co-expressed with Hes1 to examine their linkage with adipocyte stem cell differentiation in obesity.

Methodology: In this in silico analysis, Gene Expression Omnibus Dataset GDS5056 was used to shortlist 23 genes differentially up regulated and co-expressed along with Hes1 during adipocyte stem cell differentiation in obese patients. Then, these genes along with their interactor genes were submitted to Reactome pathway analysis database and were statistically analyzed.

Results: Total 12 enriched pathways were obtained which majorly belonged to two categories: neuronal cell differentiation and signaling; and inflammatory response. Since Hes1 is known to regulate such pathways as a master transcription factor and repressor, its level of expression determines the result as proliferation or differentiation. Thus, these in silico findings may help in designing future experiments to determine role of Hes1 in deciding fate of adipocyte differentiation or proliferation in obesity.