http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1440-4180
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ABSTRACT
Individuals fail to elicit protective antibody after hepatitis B vaccination remain at risk for hepatitis B virus infection. Analysis of the transcriptome of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) is essential to elucidate the characteristics of gene expression in non-responders. In this study, we enrolled seven responders who had received three injections and seven non-responders who had six injections of hepatitis B vaccine before. All the participants were then vaccinated with a three-dose boost regimen. Microarray analysis and Luminex assay were applied to examine mRNA expression and Th1/Th2/Th9/Th17/Th22/Treg cytokine and chemokine profiles in non-responders and responders. Differentially expressed genes in PBMCs of non-responders at 5 time points, i.e. pre-vaccination, 3rd, 7th, 28th day post the first dose vaccination and 7th day post the second dose vaccination indicated a dense network trend. Compared with responders, nine coding genes (BPI, DEFA1B, DEFA4, CEACAM8, MMP8, FOLR3, LTF, TCN1 and TKTL1) were significantly up-regulated in non-responders at all 5 time points, which could probably be the characteristic genes in hepatitis B vaccine non-responsiveness. Gene ontology analysis revealed that most of the DEGs were related with immune responses. Validation results of these 9 genes using quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction were mostly consistent with the results of microarray. Cytokine analysis demonstrated that IL-27 and CXCL12 concentrations in responders were significantly higher than non-responders on the 3rd day after the first dose and 7th day after the second dose of vaccination, respectively. No significant difference was observed in other cytokine and chemokine signatures between the two groups. In conclusion, our results revealed characteristic transcriptome and cytokine changes in hepatitis B vaccine non-responders after boost immunization.
Abbreviations
| PBMC | = | Peripheral blood mononuclear cell |
| HB | = | Hepatitis B |
| HLA | = | Human leukocyte antigens |
| HBsAg | = | Hepatitis B surface antigen |
| GO | = | Gene Ontology |
| IL | = | Interleukin |
| IFNG | = | Interferon-γ |
| BPI | = | Bactericidal/ permeability-increasing protein |
| CEACAM8 | = | Carcinoembryonic antigen related cell adhesion molecule 8 |
| DEFA4 | = | Defensin alpha 4 |
| LTF | = | Lactotransferrin |
| MMP8 | = | Matrix metallopeptidase 8 |
| RNASE3 | = | Ribonuclease A family member 3 |
| FOLR3 | = | Folate receptor 3 |
| TCN1 | = | Transcobalamin 1 |
| TKTL1 | = | Transketolase like 1 |
| RMA | = | Robust multichip analysis |
| qRT-PCR | = | Real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction |
Disclosure potential conflicts of interest
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Acknowledgments
We thank relevant personnel from Zhangqiu Center for Disease Control and Prevention of Shandong province for their contribution in blood sample collection.
