Figure 3.

Effect of infant’s age on the expression of differentially expressed genes in infants with AD. RT-qPCR analyses for five genes from the top 10 differentially expressed genes identified by high-throughput RNA sequencing: (a) IL18RAP, (b) IL1β, (c) TNF, (d) TREM1, and (e) EGR3 in children with AD (n = 27) and healthy controls (n = 17) after stratifying the dataset by age (0‒6 months and 7‒12 months). Fold change was calculated by 2-ΔΔCT method. The normalized expression data were log₂ transformed and shown as the means ± SD. Significant difference among groups was calculated by unpaired t test with Welch’s correction for normal distribution or with Mann‒Whitney rank-sum test for non-normal distribution data. ∗P < 0.05, ∗∗P < 0.01, ∗∗∗P < 0.001. AD, atopic dermatitis; HC, healthy control.