| Description |
Cytokines are immune glycoproteins released in a hormone-like manner to promote the regulation of the inflammatory response upon pathogen recognition. As such, their dysregulation has been linked to several physiological disorders, including autoimmune diseases. While their medical importance has been well-established, far less is known about their evolutionary patterns. In this study, we used RNA-seq data from heart, kidney, liver, and lung tissue samples collected from the same individuals of three primate species: humans (Homo sapiens), chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes), and rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta). We measured the expression of 314 previously annotated cytokine genes and quantified tissue specificity of expression using the tau metric. We found that rhesus macaques and humans demonstrated, overall, a greater degree of tissue specificity than chimpanzees. However, there was no significant difference between rhesus macaques and humans. When measuring the degree to which tissue-specific cytokines maintain the same level of cytokine tissue specificity across lineages, we did not identify any significant differences among species. Together, these results contribute to our understanding of the evolution of primate immune responses. |
