FUS regulates the alternative splicing of cell proliferation genes related to atherosclerosis in human umbilical vein endothelial cells

FUS is an RNA binding protein that plays an important role in various cellular processes including RNA splicing, DNA repair and transcriptional regulation. However, the RNA binding capacity of FUS in atherosclerosis is unclear.we knocked down FUS with siRNA to further study the overall transcriptional level and select alternative splicing (AS) of FUS regulation in human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) by RNA sequencing. The qRT-PCR strategy was used to validate FUS-modulated genes.Knockdown of FUS had significant effects on gene expression in HUVECs. Knock-down of FUS resulted in 200 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) that were highly related to apoptotic process, signal transduction, multicellular organism development, cell adhesion and regulation of transcription, DNA-templated pathways. Importantly, FUS extensively regulated 2870 alternative splicing events with a significant difference. Functional analysis of its-modulated alternative splicing genes revealed they were highly enriched in cell cycle, cell population proliferation and G2/M transition of mitotic cell cycle pathways. The results of qRT-PCR were consistent with the RNA-seq analysis.