Exercise may improve lung immunity after surgical stress: Evidence from a nephrectomy model via a bioinformatic analysis

TL;DR

This study shows that exercise may help improve lung immunity in mice after a simulated kidney surgery, based on genetic analysis.

Contribution

The study introduces a novel nephrectomy model and identifies exercise-induced immune-related gene changes in lung tissue.

Findings

Exercise after nephrectomy enriched immune-related pathways like NF-κB and B cell pathways.

Genes CD79A and IGHD were upregulated in nephrectomy mice with exercise.

Exercise caused gene expression reversals not seen in non-exercising nephrectomy groups.

Abstract

Exercise offers numerous benefits to cancer patients and plays an essential role in postsurgical cancer rehabilitation. However, there is a lack of research examining the effects of exercise after the surgical stress of nephrectomy. To address this gap, we created an animal model that simulated patients who had undergone nephrectomy with or without an exercise intervention. Next, we performed a bioinformatic analysis based on the data generated by the RNA sequencing of the lung tissue sample. An overrepresentation analysis was conducted using two genome databases (Gene Ontology and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes [KEGG]). A KEGG analysis of the exercise-treated nephrectomy mice revealed enrichment in immune-related pathways, particularly in the NF-κB and B cell-related pathways. The expression of CD79A and IGHD, which are responsible for B cell differentiation and proliferation, was upregulated in the nephrectomy mice. Differential gene expression was categorized as significantly upregulated or downregulated according to nephrectomy and exercise groups. Notably, we identified several gene expression reversals in the nephrectomy groups with exercise that were not found in the nephrectomy without exercise or control groups. Our preliminary results potentially reveal a genetic landscape for the underlying mechanisms of the effects of exercise on our nephrectomy model.

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