Meta-analysis for a therapeutic target involved in the activation of the genes associated with C3 glomerulopathy

The term C3 glomerulopathy is a group of related conditions that cause the kidneys to malfunction, characterized by the presence of glomerular deposits composed of C3 in the absence of significant amounts of Ig. On the basis of electron microscopy appearance, the subsets of C3 glomerulopathy include dense deposit disease (DDD) and C3 glomerulonephritis (C3GN). Affected individuals may have particularly low levels of a protein called complement component 3 (C3) in the blood. Glomerular diseases include many conditions with a variety of genetic and environmental causes, but they fall into two major categories; Glomerulonephritis and Glomerulosclerosis. Although glomerulonephritis and glomerulosclerosis have different causes, they can both lead to kidney failure, also called end-stage renal disease (ESRD); it is the final stage of chronic kidney disease. It can be caused by other health problems that have done permanent damage to kidneys little by little, over time. In this study we examined Gene Ontology (GO) terms, that are used to assess the results of microarray experiments. However, we propose testing groups of GO terms rather than individual terms, to improve the interpretation of gene set enrichment reduce dependence between statistical tests and improve the interpretation of results. The data analyzed here focus on the differences in microarray gene expression associated with C3 glomerulopathy in two disease subtypes.