Project - Common human genetic variants of APOE impact murine Covid-19 mortality
This project is part of the course ECBM4060: Intro to Genomic Information for Science and Technology at Columbia University. (source: Ostendorf, B.N., Patel, M.A., Bilanovic, J. et al. Common human genetic variants of APOE impact murine COVID-19 mortality. Nature 611, 346–351 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-022-05344-2)
Abstract
Motivation: It is understood that genetic variants play a crucial role in the heterogeneity of Covid-19 outcomes. Quantifying the unexplored underlying mechanisms of genetic mutations, presents a great opportunity to further elucidate the causality between the genetic variants and mortality rates from Covid-19.
Results: We illustrate that mutations of the APOE gene in mice (APOE2,APOE4), exhibit an increased Covid-19 progression and viral loads relative to mice having the APOE3 gene. Additionally our findings suggest that APOE2,APOE4 negatively affect antiviral immunity.