Differences in the transcriptome of responders and non‐responders on glucose metabolism markers after fish oil supplementation

Abstract

An intervention study conducted in young Mexican adults showed significant improvement of the supplementation with fish oil (FO) on glucose metabolism. Differences in the response among subjects were observed. Gene expression in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) has been used as a proxy of the effect of nutritional interventions in other tissues. We compared the changes in the transcriptome of PBMC induced by FO supplementation (2.7 g of DHA + EPA during six weeks) in subjects with contrasting responses in fasting insulin concentrations. Participants with the largest decrease (group A, n=16) in fasting insulin (5.64 mg/dL ± 6.87) and the largest increase (group B, n=16) in fasting insulin (−5.96mg/dL ± 6.59) were selected, and pair‐matched by age, sex, change in ω3 index and BMI. RNA analysis was conducted using high throughput RNA sequencing (Illumina). Data analysis included data preprocessing, mapping, assembly of transcripts, differential expression of gene and pathway analysis. Differences were observed between groups at baseline in 68 genes. After 6 weeks of intervention 49 genes changed in group A while 14 genes changed in group B, and 258 genes showed significant difference between groups (p<0.05; 75 genes upregulated, 183 genes downregulated). Transcripts with the most significant changes between groups are CXCL2 (FC = −1.95 p=0.015) IL‐1β (FC=−1.82, p=0.021), NR4A3 (FC=−1.82, p=0.016), which are related with inflammatory response and glucose metabolism. These findings suggest that the reduction in insulin concentrations is associated with the decrease of the expression of genes related to inflammatory pathways in PBMC.Support or Funding InformationNESTEC & INMEGEN