Fig. 2

Expression of genes functional in NETosis increases in blood with COVID-19 disease severity. Gene expression data [13] were collected from healthy control subjects (n = 10), and COVID-19 patients sampled at multiple time points: moderate illness (2 patients, 13 samples), severe illness (1 patient, 9 samples). (A) Column sidebar on the top marks healthy control as green, moderate illness as cyan, and severe illness as red. Each row represents a gene participating in NETosis. The colour of the cell represents the level of expression, low as blue and high as red. Magnitude of up-regulation of NETosis genes is greater in the case with severe COVID-19 illness (as shown by the greater number of red cells for case 1 – severe illness). (B) Each bar represents the mean log-expression of a gene across all-time samples from either moderate or severe illness. Error bar represents standard deviation of gene expression levels across all samples in that group of illness severity. For most of the genes there is a higher level of gene expression in severe illness compared to moderate illness. Significance of up-regulation in severe illness was assessed by t-test and is indicated with an asterisk over the bars (** p < 0.01; *** p < 0.001). (C) For each of the days 6, 7, 8 and 9 (post-onset), box plot shows higher level of gene expression functional in NETosis in a patient with severe COVID-19 illness compared to a patient with moderate COVID-19 illness