Understanding Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) from CAMDA Data: A Systems Biology Approach

We start by constructing gene-gene association networks based on about 300 genes whose expression values vary between the groups of CFS patients (plus control). Connected components (modules) from these networks are further inspected for their predictive ability for symptom severity and genotypes of two single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) known to be associated with symptom severity. We use two different network construction methods and choose the common genes identified in both for added validation. Our analysis identified eleven genes which may play important roles in certain aspects of CFS or related symptoms. In particular, the gene WASF3 (aka WAVE3) possibly regulates brain cytokines involved in the mechanism of fatigue through the p38 MAPK regulatory pathway. 1 Introduction and a summary Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) is a relatively rare, poorly understood, complex disorder that is characterized by severe and chronic physical and mental fatigue not attributable to other causes (dis-eases) which is sometimes accompanied by other symptoms such as weak immune response, digestive problems and depression. A great deal of effort has been put forth in recent years in collecting clinical