Key Genes Associated with Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease and Acute Myocardial Infarction

BACKGROUND: With increasing research on non-alcoholic fatty liver (NAFLD) and acute myocardial infarction (AMI), many studies show a tight correlation between NAFLD and AMI, but the underlying pathophysiology is still not clear. This study was performed to identify the potential hub genes and pathways related to these 2 diseases by using the bioinformatics method. MATERIAL/METHODS: The Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) dataset GSE63067 of NAFLD patients and normal controls was downloaded from the GEO database. The GSE60993 and GSE66360 datasets for AMI patients and healthy controls were also obtained. Differentially expressed genes (DEGs) of NAFLD and AMI datasets and the common genes between them were obtained. Further GO and KEGG enrichment analyses for common genes were performed. To define the pathogenesis associated with both NAFLD and AMI, a protein–protein interaction (PPI) network was constructed. Finally, SPSS software was utilized to analyze the diagnostic value of hub genes in the NAFLD and AMI datasets, respectively. RESULTS: Seventy-eight common genes were obtained in NAFLD and AMI with the threshold of P-value <0.05. Thirty-one GO terms and 10 KEGG pathways were obtained. Also, the top 10 hub genes (TLR2, LILRB2, CXCL1, FPR1, TLR4, TYROBP, MMP9, FCER1G, CLEC4D, and CCR2) were selected with P<0.05. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this study suggest that some novel genes play an important role in the occurrence and progression NAFLD and AMI. More experimental research and clinical trials are needed to verify our results.