Figure 5. Tregs in acute sJIA and Teffs in chronic sJIA demonstrate a Th17 gene expression signature.

(A) Top enriched gene sets in peripheral blood (PB) Tregs (CD4⁺CD25⁺CD127^lo) from patients with acute sJIA (n = 8) compared with pediatric healthy controls (n = 3) based on the normalized enrichment score (NES) from Gene Set Enrichment Analysis (GSEA). (B) The enrichment plots of the Th17 transcription factor gene set from the GSEA in A. (C) Top enriched gene sets in PB Teffs (CD4⁺CD25^–) from patients with chronic sJIA (n = 7) compared with adult healthy controls (n = 4) based on the NES from GSEA. (D and E) The enrichment plots of the IL-6/JAK/STAT3 and Th17 transcription factor gene sets from the GSEA in C. (F) RNA sequencing expression data for the given genes in PB Teffs from healthy adult controls (n = 4) (mean ± SD) and SF Teffs from 2 patients with chronic sJIA. All displayed gene sets have an FDR < 0.1. sJIA, systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis; Pedi, pediatric; TF, transcription factor; Ox Phos, oxidative phosphorylation; Teff, effector T cell; TPM, transcripts per million; SF, synovial fluid