A Meta-Analysis of the Effects of Chronic Stress on the Prefrontal Transcriptome in Animal Models and Convergence with Existing Human Data
Abstract
Background Chronic stress is a major risk factor for psychiatric disorders, including anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder. Chronic stress can cause structural alterations like grey matter atrophy in key emotion-related areas such as the prefrontal cortex (PFC). To identify biological pathways affected by chronic stress in the PFC, researchers have performed transcriptional profiling (RNA-sequencing, microarray) to measure gene expression in rodent models. However, transcriptional signatures in the PFC that are shared across different chronic stress paradigms and laboratories remain relatively unexplored. Methods We performed a meta-analysis of publicly available transcriptional profiling datasets within the Gemma database. We identified six datasets that characterized the effects of either chronic social defeat stress (CSDS) or chronic unpredictable mild stress (CUMS) on gene expression in the PFC in mice (n=117). We fit a random effects meta-analysis model to the chronic stress effect sizes (log(2) fold changes) for each transcript (n=21,379) measured in most datasets. We then compared our results with two other published chronic stress meta-analyses, as well as transcriptional signatures associated with psychiatric disorders. Results We identified 133 genes that were consistently differentially expressed across chronic stress studies and paradigms (false discovery rate (FDR)<0.05). Fast Gene Set Enrichment Analysis (fGSEA) revealed 53 gene sets enriched…
How strong is the evidence?
Evidence Hub reads this as a meta-analysis, done in animal, not in people. Its evidence level is 5 of 5 (Very low · case / narrative / animal / in vitro / in silico). Case reports, narrative reviews, and animal, cell or computer-model studies give the weakest evidence for human health. Reported size: 21,379 participants or records.
Read the paper
Related studies
- Improving sleep quality leads to better mental health: A meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials
- Tocilizumab in patients with severe COVID-19: a retrospective cohort study
- A new aging measure captures morbidity and mortality risk across diverse subpopulations from NHANES IV: A cohort study
- Fruit, vegetable, and legume intake, and cardiovascular disease and deaths in 18 countries (PURE): a prospective cohort study
- Are noise and air pollution related to the incidence of dementia? A cohort study in London, England
- Long COVID symptoms and duration in SARS-CoV-2 positive children — a nationwide cohort study
Go deeper in Evidence Hub
Evidence Hub adds a study data sheet (design, sample size, evidence level, key numbers), an AI summary and a chat grounded in the paper's text.