Regulatory gene networks and signaling pathways from primary osteoarthritis and Kashin-Beck disease, an endemic osteoarthritis, identified by three analysis software.

Three new software systems, Ingenuity pathway analysis(IPA, TranscriptomeBrowser and MetaCore, were compared by analyzing chondrocyte microarray data of Kashin-Beck disease (KBD) and primary knee osteoarthritis(OA) to understand the pathway or network analysis software which has a superior function to identify target genes with easy operation and effective for differential diagnosis and treatment of KBD and OA. RNA was isolated from cartilage samples taken from KBD patients and OA ones. Agilent 44K human whole genome oligonucleotide microarrays were used to detect differentially expressed genes. From IPA, we identified one significant canonical pathway and two significant networks. From GeneHub analysis, we got three networks. One significant canonical pathway and one significant network were obtained from TranscriptomeBrowser analysis. POSTN and LEF1 which were got from IPA, RAC2 which was identified by both of the IPA and TranscriptomeBrowser may be most closely related to the etiopathogenesis of KBD. According to our data analysis, IPA and TranscriptomeBrowser are suitable for pathway analysis, while, TranscriptomeBrowser is suitable for network analysis. The significant genes obtained from IPA and TranscriptomeBrowser analysis may thus provide a better understanding of the molecular details in the pathogenesis of KBD and also provide useful pathways and network maps for future research in osteochondrosis.