RESEARCH ARTICLE
Low Serum Hepcidin in Patients with Autoimmune Liver Diseases Aggeliki Lyberopoulou1,6☯, Georgia Chachami1,6☯, Nikolaos K. Gatselis2☯, Eleni Kyratzopoulou3☯, Asterios Saitis2, Stella Gabeta2, Petros Eliades3, Efrosini Paraskeva4, Kalliopi Zachou2, George K. Koukoulis5, Avgi Mamalaki3, George N. Dalekos2*, George Simos1,6* 1 Laboratory of Biochemistry, Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Larissa, Greece, 2 Department of Medicine & Research Laboratory of Internal Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Larissa, Greece, 3 Laboratory of Molecular Biology and Immunobiotechnology, Hellenic Pasteur Institute, Athens, Greece, 4 Laboratory of Physiology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Larissa, Greece, 5 Department of Pathology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Larissa, Greece, 6 Institute for Research & Technology—Thessaly (IRETETH), Larissa, Greece ☯ These authors contributed equally to this work. * [email protected] (GS); [email protected] (GND)
OPEN ACCESS Citation: Lyberopoulou A, Chachami G, Gatselis NK, Kyratzopoulou E, Saitis A, Gabeta S, et al. (2015) Low Serum Hepcidin in Patients with Autoimmune Liver Diseases. PLoS ONE 10(8): e0135486. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0135486 Editor: Pavel Strnad, RWTH Aachen, GERMANY Received: March 8, 2015 Accepted: July 22, 2015 Published: August 13, 2015 Copyright: © 2015 Lyberopoulou et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Data Availability Statement: All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files. Funding: This work was supported by program 09SYN-12-682, which is implemented under the auspices of NSRF and the National Range Action “COOPERATION” and co-funded by the Greek Government and the European Union - European Regional Development Fund. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
Abstract Hepcidin, a liver hormone, is important for both innate immunity and iron metabolism regulation. As dysfunction of the hepcidin pathway may contribute to liver pathology, we analysed liver hepcidin mRNA and serum hepcidin in patients with chronic liver diseases. Hepcidin mRNA levels were determined in liver biopsies obtained from 126 patients with HCV (n = 21), HBV (n = 23), autoimmune cholestatic disease (primary biliary cirrhosis and primary sclerosing cholangitis; PBC/PSC; n = 34), autoimmune hepatitis (AIH; n = 16) and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD; n = 32). Sera sampled on the biopsy day from the same patients were investigated for serum hepcidin levels. Hepatic hepcidin mRNA levels correlated positively with ferritin and negatively with serum γ-GT levels. However, no correlation was found between serum hepcidin and either ferritin or liver hepcidin mRNA. Both serum hepcidin and the serum hepcidin/ferritin ratio were significantly lower in AIH and PBC/PSC patients’ sera compared to HBV, HCV or NAFLD (P
Low Serum Hepcidin in Patients with Autoimmune Liver Diseases Aggeliki Lyberopoulou1,6☯, Georgia Chachami1,6☯, Nikolaos K. Gatselis2☯, Eleni Kyratzopoulou3☯, Asterios Saitis2, Stella Gabeta2, Petros Eliades3, Efrosini Paraskeva4, Kalliopi Zachou2, George K. Koukoulis5, Avgi Mamalaki3, George N. Dalekos2*, George Simos1,6* 1 Laboratory of Biochemistry, Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Larissa, Greece, 2 Department of Medicine & Research Laboratory of Internal Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Larissa, Greece, 3 Laboratory of Molecular Biology and Immunobiotechnology, Hellenic Pasteur Institute, Athens, Greece, 4 Laboratory of Physiology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Larissa, Greece, 5 Department of Pathology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Larissa, Greece, 6 Institute for Research & Technology—Thessaly (IRETETH), Larissa, Greece ☯ These authors contributed equally to this work. * [email protected] (GS); [email protected] (GND)
OPEN ACCESS Citation: Lyberopoulou A, Chachami G, Gatselis NK, Kyratzopoulou E, Saitis A, Gabeta S, et al. (2015) Low Serum Hepcidin in Patients with Autoimmune Liver Diseases. PLoS ONE 10(8): e0135486. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0135486 Editor: Pavel Strnad, RWTH Aachen, GERMANY Received: March 8, 2015 Accepted: July 22, 2015 Published: August 13, 2015 Copyright: © 2015 Lyberopoulou et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Data Availability Statement: All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files. Funding: This work was supported by program 09SYN-12-682, which is implemented under the auspices of NSRF and the National Range Action “COOPERATION” and co-funded by the Greek Government and the European Union - European Regional Development Fund. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
Abstract Hepcidin, a liver hormone, is important for both innate immunity and iron metabolism regulation. As dysfunction of the hepcidin pathway may contribute to liver pathology, we analysed liver hepcidin mRNA and serum hepcidin in patients with chronic liver diseases. Hepcidin mRNA levels were determined in liver biopsies obtained from 126 patients with HCV (n = 21), HBV (n = 23), autoimmune cholestatic disease (primary biliary cirrhosis and primary sclerosing cholangitis; PBC/PSC; n = 34), autoimmune hepatitis (AIH; n = 16) and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD; n = 32). Sera sampled on the biopsy day from the same patients were investigated for serum hepcidin levels. Hepatic hepcidin mRNA levels correlated positively with ferritin and negatively with serum γ-GT levels. However, no correlation was found between serum hepcidin and either ferritin or liver hepcidin mRNA. Both serum hepcidin and the serum hepcidin/ferritin ratio were significantly lower in AIH and PBC/PSC patients’ sera compared to HBV, HCV or NAFLD (P
