Identification of Key Genes in Type 2 Diabetes-Induced Erectile Dysfunction Rats with Stem Cell Therapy Through High-Throughput Sequencing and Bioinformatic Analysis
March 2021
in “
Andrologia
”
TLDR Stem cell therapy affects 15 key genes in rats with diabetes-related erectile dysfunction.
The study investigated the effects of mesenchymal stem cell (MSC) therapy on erectile dysfunction induced by type 2 diabetes in a rat model. Researchers performed transcriptome sequencing on penile tissue from normal, diabetic, and MSC-treated rats, identifying 1,097 differentially expressed genes (DEGs), with 189 upregulated and 908 downregulated. Key enriched functions of upregulated DEGs included extracellular matrix organization and wound healing, while downregulated DEGs were associated with peptidase activity and hair follicle development. A protein-protein interaction network revealed 15 hub genes potentially involved in erectile dysfunction. The findings suggested that MSC therapy could modulate gene expression related to erectile function, though further research is needed to understand the underlying molecular mechanisms.