Table 1.
Clinical features of the patients with PsA included in the study.
Fig 1.
Gene expression profiles of synovial membranes obtained from 10 PsA patients and from 10 healthy subjects.
The heat map shows the expression levels of all the modulated genes. Blue-violet indicates genes that are expressed in synovial biopsies of PsA patients at lower levels when compared with the mean values of the control subjects, orange-red indicates genes that are expressed at higher levels when compared to the control means and yellow indicates genes that are not differently expressed in the patients group versus the control group. Each row represents a gene; each column shows the expression of selected genes in each individual (see S1 Table for complete list of genes expression data). On both sides of the heat map a selection of genes is shown. Green and red squares indicate upregulated and downregulated genes respectively.
Table 2.
Annotated genes differentially expressed in PsA synovial membranes versus healthy synovial membranes grouped according to their function.
Fig 2.
Real time RT-PCR of some modulated genes.
Genes selected for validation were SPP1, CXCL13, CCL18, LAMP3 and CADM1. The transcripts of the selected genes were increased in PsA samples when compared to healthy donors. Relative expression levels were calculated for each sample after normalization against the housekeeping gene GAPDH. Experiments have been conducted in triplicates. Similar results were obtained using the housekeeping genes18s rRNA and beta-actin (data not shown).
Table 3.
Annotated genes differentially expressed in PsA synovial membranes and in PsA PBC versus healthy controls grouped according to their function.
Fig 3.
Flow cytometric analysis of IL-17 producing CD4+ lymphocytes in patients with PsA.
Data are representative of all the 30 subjects studied. A and B panels show the percentages of IL-17 producing CD4+ lymphocytes in PBMC of healthy donors (N.S) and patients affected by PsA (PsA) after stimulation with Dynabeads Human T-Activator CD3/CD28 (panel a) or with heat-inactivated Candida albicans (panel b).
Fig 4.
Serum levels of selected soluble mediators in PsA patients and in normal subjects.
The histograms represent the mean of the results obtained in 30 healthy donors and in 30 PsA patients. p values were calculated using the non-parametric Mann-Whitney test.
Fig 5.
Serum levels of osteopontin and osteoactivin in PsA patients and in control subjects.
Graphical representation of the distributions of osteopontin (A) and osteoactivin (B) serum levels in: 60 psoriatic arthritis (PsA) patients, 60 rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients, 60 ankylosing spondylitis (AS) patients and in 60 normal subjects (NS). p values were calculated using the non-parametric Mann-Whitney test: Osteopontin: PsA vs NS: p <0.01; PsA vs SA: p <0.01, PsA vs AR: p not significant. Osteoactivin: PsA vs NS: p <0.01; PsA vs SA: p <0.05; PsA vs AR: p <0.01.
Fig 6.
Sensitivity and specificity of the assay of osteoactivin levels between PsA patients and control subjects.
AUC: area under the curve; CI: confidence interval.