bioinformatics analysis of genes related to pathogenesis of alopecia universalis

Background and aim: alopecia is an autoimmune disease that can involve any part of the individual's body. this disease is indicated in a completely distinctive area and usually circular, in the form of hair loss without scarring. the course of this disease varies in every person. four types of alopecia are known as: patchy type, transient patchy type, alopecia totalis and alopecia universalis (au). in this study, the gene expression profiles in au has been studied with bioinformatics analysis.methods: the gse68801 was downloaded from gene expression omnibus database (geo) and differentially expressed genes (degs) in au patients (n=23) compared with controls (n=36) were identified by transcriptome analysis console (tac). degs’ protein–protein interaction map constructed by string and drawing with cytoscape.results: the analyses showed that tumor necrosis factor (tnf) and protein tyrosine phosphatase receptor type c (ptprc) are two key over expressed genes and actinin alpha-1 (actn1) and tropomyosin alpha-1 (tpm1) are main low expressed genes. eventually, functional enrichment analysis outstanding that these genes were closely relating with two main pathways; chemokine signaling and proteoglycans in cancer.conclusion: taken together, the key genes were obtained by analyzing the microarray and the degs of au in the present study, which would provide important clues for drug discovery and revealing the molecular mechanism and clinical targeted therapy of this type of disease.