Affiliations: Division of Viral and Rickettsial Diseases, National
Center for Infectious Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,
Atlanta, GA 30333, USA
Note: [] Address for correspondence: Suzanne D. Vernon, Ph.D., Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention, 1600 Clifton Road Mail, Stop A-15, Atlanta,
30333, USA. Tel.: +1 404 639 1338; Fax: +1 404 639 2779; E-mail:
svernon@cdc.gov
Abstract: Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) is a debilitating illness lacking
consistent anatomic lesions and eluding conventional laboratory diagnosis.
Demonstration of the utility of the blood for gene expression profiling and
biomarker discovery would have implications into the pathophysiology of CFS.
The objective of this study was to determine if gene expression profiles of
peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PMBCs) could distinguish between subjects
with CFS and healthy controls. Total RNA from PBMCs of five CFS cases and
seventeen controls was labeled and hybridized to 1764 genes on filter arrays.
Gene intensity values were analyzed by various classification algorithms and
nonparametric statistical methods. The classification algorithms grouped the
majority of the CFS cases together, and distinguished them from the healthy
controls. Eight genes were differentially expressed in both an age-matched
case-control analysis and when comparing all CFS cases to all controls. Several
of the diffrentially expressed genes are associated with immunologic functions
(e.g., CMRF35 antigen, IL-8, HD protein) and implicate immune dysfunction in
the pathophysiology of CFS. These results successfully demonstrate the utility
of the blood for gene expression profiling to distinguish subjects with CFS
from healthy controls and for identifying genes that could serve as CFS
biomarkers.
