Abstract: Objective:?Screening for differentially expressed genes between inflammatory pulp and healthy pulp. Methods:? Transcriptome RNA sequencing was performed on 5 inflammatory dental pulp samples and 6 healthy dental pulp samples. Differentially expressed genes were screened for bioinformatics analysis. Results:? A total of 1 216 differentially expressed genes were screened out, including 831 up-regulated genes and 385 down-regulated genes. GO analysis revealed that the differentially expressed genes were concentrated in the functional sets consisting of inflammatory response, immune response and cell adhesion. KEGG pathway analysis showed that the differentially expressed genes were enriched in inflammatory pathways such as cytokine-cytokine receptor interactions, chemokine signaling pathways and osteoclast differentiation. GSEA results were also enriched in the inflammatory response pathway, TNF-α signaling pathway via NF-κB, and IL6/JAK/STAT3 signaling pathway. According to the degrees of nodes in the PPI network, 6 hub genes related to pulpitis were screened out: PTPRC, ITGAM, CD86, IL10, TLR4 and TLR2. Conclusions:? There were significantly statistical differences in the overall gene expression between inflammatory and healthy pulp. Most of the differentially expressed genes are concentrated in the functions and signaling pathways of inflammation and immune response, and the related genes have potential value as biomarkers for the diagnosis of pulpitis.

Key words: pulpitis, hub genes, biomarkers, transcriptome RNA sequencing, bioinformatic analysis