Integrative analysis correlates donor transcripts to recipient autoantibodies in primary graft dysfunction after lung transplantation

Up to one in four lung‐transplanted patients develop pulmonary infiltrates and impaired oxygenation within the first days after lung transplantation. Known as primary graft dysfunction (PGD), this condition increases mortality significantly. Complex interactions between donor lung and recipient immune system are the suspected cause. We took an integrative, systems‐level approach by first exploring whether the recipient’s immune response to PGD includes the development of long‐lasting autoreactivity. We next explored whether proteins displaying such differential autoreactivity also display differential gene expression in donor lungs that later develop PGD compared with those that did not. We evaluated 39 patients from whom autoantibody profiles were already available for PGD based on chest radiographs and oxygenation data. An additional nine patients were evaluated for PGD based on their medical records and set aside for validation. From two recent donor lung gene expression studies, we reanalysed and paired gene profiles with autoantibody profiles. Primary graft dysfunction can be distinguished by a profile of differentially reactive autoantibodies binding to 17 proteins. Functional analysis showed that 12 of these proteins are part of a protein–protein interaction network (P = 3 × 10−6) involved in proliferative processes. A nearest centroid classifier assigned correct PGD grades to eight out of the nine patients in the validation cohort (P = 0·048). We observed significant positive correlation (r = 0·63, P = 0·011) between differences in IgM reactivity and differences in gene expression levels. This connection between donor lung gene expression and long‐lasting recipient IgM autoantibodies towards a specific set of proteins suggests a mechanism for the development of autoimmunity in PGD.