Functional study of acetaldehyde dehydrogenase 1 (ALDH1) in keratinocytes: microarray integrating bioinformatics approaches

Abstract

The function of acetaldehyde dehydrogenase 1 (ALDH1) has been gradually elucidated in several diseases, especially in various cancers. However, the role of ALDH1 in skin-related diseases has been mostly unknown. Previously, we found that ALDH1 is involved in the pathogenesis of atopic dermatitis (AD). In this study, we used high-throughput screening (HTS) approaches to identify critical factors associated with ALDH1 in human keratinocytes to reveal its functions in skin. We overexpressed ALDH1 in human HaCaT keratinocytes and then conducted serial HTS studies, a DNA microarray and antibody array integrated with bioinformatics algorithms. Together, those tests identified several novel genes associated with the function of ALDH1 in keratinocytes, as well as AD, including CTSG and CCL11. In particular, GNB3, GHSR, TAS2R9, FFAR1, TAS2R16, CCL21, GPR32, NPFFR1, GPR15, FBXW12, CCL19, EDNRA, FFAR3, and RXFP3 proteins were consistently detected as hub proteins in the PPI maps. By integrating the datasets obtained from these HTS studies and using the strengths of each method, we obtained new insights into the functional role of ALDH1 in skin keratinocytes. The approach used here could contribute to the clinical understanding of ALDH1-associated applications for the treatment of AD.

Communicated by Ramaswamy H. Sarma

Keywords:

• ALDH1
• keratinocytes
• microarray
• antibody array
• PPI maps

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by a fund from the Public Project of Jiaxing City (No. 2018AY32042). Dr. Jun-Mo Yang was supported by a grant of the Korea Health Technology R&D Project through the Korean Health Industry Development Institute (KHIDI), funded by the Ministry of Health & Welfare, Republic of Korea (grant number: HI17C0616) and by National R&D Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning (2017R1D1A1B03029114). Dr. Yong-Doo Park was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Korea government (MSIP; Ministry of Science, ICT & Future Planning) (No. 2017R1A6A3A11033277).