Alexandre Loupy1, Jean Paul Duong Van Huyen2, Luis Hidalgo2, Jeff Reeve2, Maud Racapé2, Olivier Aubert2, Jeffery M Venner2, Konrad Falmuski2, Marie Cécile Bories2, Thibaut Beuscart2, Romain Guillemain2, Arnaud François2, Sabine Pattier2, Claire Toquet2, Arnaud Gay2, Philippe Rouvier2, Shaida Varnous2, Pascal Leprince2, Jean Philippe Empana2, Carmen Lefaucheur2, Patrick Bruneval2, Xavier Jouven2, Philip F Halloran2. 1. From Paris Descartes University and Hôpital Necker, Assistance Publique-Hôpitaux de Paris, France (A.L., J.P.D.V.H., M.R.); Paris Translational Research Centre for Organ Transplantation, INSERM, UMR-S970, France (A.L., J.P.D.V.H., O.A., T.B., J.P.E., C.L., P.B., X.J.); Pathology Department, Necker Hospital, Paris, France (J.P.D.V.H.); Alberta Transplant Applied Genomics Centre; University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada (L.H., J.R., J.M.V., K.F., P.F.H.); Cardiology Department and Intensive Care (M.C.B.), Cardiology and Heart Transplant Department (R.G., X.J.), and Pathology Department (P.B.), Georges Pompidou Hospital, Paris, France; Pathology (P.R.) and Cardiac Surgery Departments (S.V., P.L.), La Pitié Salpétrière Hospital, Paris; Pathology (C.T.) and Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery Departments (S.P), Laennec Hospital, Nantes; Pathology (A.F.) and Cardiovascular Surgery Departments (A.G), Charles Nicolle Hospital, Rouen, France. alexandre.loupy@inserm.fr. 2. From Paris Descartes University and Hôpital Necker, Assistance Publique-Hôpitaux de Paris, France (A.L., J.P.D.V.H., M.R.); Paris Translational Research Centre for Organ Transplantation, INSERM, UMR-S970, France (A.L., J.P.D.V.H., O.A., T.B., J.P.E., C.L., P.B., X.J.); Pathology Department, Necker Hospital, Paris, France (J.P.D.V.H.); Alberta Transplant Applied Genomics Centre; University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada (L.H., J.R., J.M.V., K.F., P.F.H.); Cardiology Department and Intensive Care (M.C.B.), Cardiology and Heart Transplant Department (R.G., X.J.), and Pathology Department (P.B.), Georges Pompidou Hospital, Paris, France; Pathology (P.R.) and Cardiac Surgery Departments (S.V., P.L.), La Pitié Salpétrière Hospital, Paris; Pathology (C.T.) and Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery Departments (S.P), Laennec Hospital, Nantes; Pathology (A.F.) and Cardiovascular Surgery Departments (A.G), Charles Nicolle Hospital, Rouen, France.
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Antibody-mediated rejection (AMR) contributes to heart allograft loss. However, an important knowledge gap remains in terms of the pathophysiology of AMR and how detection of immune activity, injury degree, and stage could be improved by intragraft gene expression profiling. METHODS: We prospectively monitored 617 heart transplant recipients referred from 4 French transplant centers (January 1, 2006-January 1, 2011) for AMR. We compared patients with AMR (n=55) with a matched control group of 55 patients without AMR. We characterized all patients using histopathology (ISHLT [International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation] 2013 grades), immunostaining, and circulating anti-HLA donor-specific antibodies at the time of biopsy, together with systematic gene expression assessments of the allograft tissue, using microarrays. Effector cells were evaluated with in vitro human cell cultures. We studied a validation cohort of 98 heart recipients transplanted in Edmonton, AB, Canada, including 27 cases of AMR and 71 controls. RESULTS: A total of 240 heart transplant endomyocardial biopsies were assessed. AMR showed a distinct pattern of injury characterized by endothelial activation with microcirculatory inflammation by monocytes/macrophages and natural killer (NK) cells. We also observed selective changes in endothelial/angiogenesis and NK cell transcripts, including CD16A signaling and interferon-γ-inducible genes. The AMR-selective gene sets accurately discriminated patients with AMR from those without and included NK transcripts (area under the curve=0.87), endothelial activation transcripts (area under the curve=0.80), macrophage transcripts (area under the curve=0.86), and interferon-γ transcripts (area under the curve=0.84; P<0.0001 for all comparisons). These 4 gene sets showed increased expression with increasing pathological AMR (pAMR) International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation grade (P<0.001) and association with donor-specific antibody levels. The unsupervised principal components analysis demonstrated a high proportion of molecularly inactive pAMR1(I+), and there was significant molecular overlap between pAMR1(H+) and full-blown pAMR2/3 cases. Endothelial activation transcripts, interferon-γ, and NK transcripts showed association with chronic allograft vasculopathy. The molecular architecture and selective AMR transcripts, together with gene set discrimination capacity for AMR identified in the discovery set, were reproduced in the validation cohort. CONCLUSIONS: Tissue-based measurements of specific pathogenesis-based transcripts reflecting NK burden, endothelial activation, macrophage burden, and interferon-γ effects accurately classify AMR and correlate with degree of injury and disease activity. This study illustrates the clinical potential of a tissue-based analysis of gene transcripts to refine diagnosis of heart transplant rejection.
BACKGROUND: Antibody-mediated rejection (AMR) contributes to heart allograft loss. However, an important knowledge gap remains in terms of the pathophysiology of AMR and how detection of immune activity, injury degree, and stage could be improved by intragraft gene expression profiling. METHODS: We prospectively monitored 617 heart transplant recipients referred from 4 French transplant centers (January 1, 2006-January 1, 2011) for AMR. We compared patients with AMR (n=55) with a matched control group of 55 patients without AMR. We characterized all patients using histopathology (ISHLT [International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation] 2013 grades), immunostaining, and circulating anti-HLA donor-specific antibodies at the time of biopsy, together with systematic gene expression assessments of the allograft tissue, using microarrays. Effector cells were evaluated with in vitro human cell cultures. We studied a validation cohort of 98 heart recipients transplanted in Edmonton, AB, Canada, including 27 cases of AMR and 71 controls. RESULTS: A total of 240 heart transplant endomyocardial biopsies were assessed. AMR showed a distinct pattern of injury characterized by endothelial activation with microcirculatory inflammation by monocytes/macrophages and natural killer (NK) cells. We also observed selective changes in endothelial/angiogenesis and NK cell transcripts, including CD16A signaling and interferon-γ-inducible genes. The AMR-selective gene sets accurately discriminated patients with AMR from those without and included NK transcripts (area under the curve=0.87), endothelial activation transcripts (area under the curve=0.80), macrophage transcripts (area under the curve=0.86), and interferon-γ transcripts (area under the curve=0.84; P<0.0001 for all comparisons). These 4 gene sets showed increased expression with increasing pathological AMR (pAMR) International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation grade (P<0.001) and association with donor-specific antibody levels. The unsupervised principal components analysis demonstrated a high proportion of molecularly inactive pAMR1(I+), and there was significant molecular overlap between pAMR1(H+) and full-blown pAMR2/3 cases. Endothelial activation transcripts, interferon-γ, and NK transcripts showed association with chronic allograft vasculopathy. The molecular architecture and selective AMR transcripts, together with gene set discrimination capacity for AMR identified in the discovery set, were reproduced in the validation cohort. CONCLUSIONS: Tissue-based measurements of specific pathogenesis-based transcripts reflecting NK burden, endothelial activation, macrophage burden, and interferon-γ effects accurately classify AMR and correlate with degree of injury and disease activity. This study illustrates the clinical potential of a tissue-based analysis of gene transcripts to refine diagnosis of heart transplant rejection.
Authors: Carrie L Butler; Michelle J Hickey; Ning Jiang; Ying Zheng; David Gjertson; Qiuheng Zhang; Ping Rao; Gregory A Fishbein; Martin Cadeiras; Mario C Deng; Hector L Banchs; Guillermo Torre; David DeNofrio; Howard J Eisen; Jon Kobashigawa; Randall C Starling; Abdallah Kfoury; Adrian Van Bakel; Gregory Ewald; Ivan Balazs; Arnold S Baas; Daniel Cruz; Reza Ardehali; Reshma Biniwale; Murray Kwon; Abbas Ardehali; Ali Nsair; Bryan Ray; Elaine F Reed Journal: Am J Transplant Date: 2020-04-26 Impact factor: 8.086
Authors: Philip F Halloran; Jeff Reeve; Arezu Z Aliabadi; Martin Cadeiras; Marisa G Crespo-Leiro; Mario Deng; Eugene C Depasquale; Johannes Goekler; Xavier Jouven; Daniel H Kim; Jon Kobashigawa; Alexandre Loupy; Peter Macdonald; Luciano Potena; Andreas Zuckermann; Michael D Parkes Journal: JCI Insight Date: 2018-10-18