The Role of Host Genetics and Microbes in Paediatric Infections

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About this Research Topic

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Background

Severe infections are the leading cause of death in children. The overall disease burden of pediatric sepsis is high, with a mortality rate of 21%-32% for children with sepsis in PICUs in North America and Europe and up to 40% in Asia. Nearly 75,000 children are hospitalized with severe sepsis each year in the USA and approximately 360,000 in China. In infectious diseases, both the genetic factors of the host and the pathogenic microorganisms play an important role. There are significant differences in the virulence of different pathogenic microorganisms, even between different subtypes of the same microorganism, as is seen with Ebola virus and herpes simplex virus, and different subtypes of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Patients infected by the same type of pathogen may have significantly different clinical outcomes, and such variations have long been thought to be due to genetic factors in the host. Various single gene variants can lead to increased patient susceptibility or resistance to pathogenic microorganisms. For example, the Mendelian susceptibility to mycobacterial infections is caused by inborn errors of IFN-γ immunity with mutations of IFNGR1, IFNGR2, NEMO, and other genes. Variants in CCR5, on the other hand, can lead to resistance to HIV-1. With the development of genomic technologies, genome-wide association analysis has identified a number of loci that affect susceptibility to infectious diseases, including tuberculosis and HIV. WES and WGS have played an important role in the genetic testing of children with severe infections. The rapid WES/WGS tests significantly shorten the turnaround time, and the results help to adjust the treatment regimen timely. In recent years, mNGS has been widely used for the diagnosis of pediatric infectious diseases and frequently identifies infections that are not identified by conventional methods.

This Research Topic focuses on the role of host genetic factors, pathogens factors, and the interactions between them that accept susceptibility to and severity of severe infections in children. We welcome Original Research and Review articles on the following aspects:
• Genetic testing based on whole-genome/whole-exome sequencing technology for children with severe infections.
• Diagnosis of pediatric infectious disease using multi-omics technologies, such as genome sequencing, transcriptome sequencing, proteomics, metabolomics, metagenomics.
• Novel molecular, proteins (cytokines, signal molecules) and metabolite markers involving the occurrence, development and clinical manifestations of pediatric severe infection.
• The interactions between microorganisms and host.

Keywords: pediatric infection, sepsis, genetic sequencing, metagenomics

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