Aim: Screening of candidate genes related to sural nerve diabetic neuropathy to find the critical ones is the aim of this study.
Back Ground: Diabetes mellitus is a chronic disease causes by insulin uptake or deficiency. Side effects of diabetes are numerous according to severity of disease. Diabetes could harm the peripheral nerves with chronic pain, lead to nerve damage entitled diabetic neuropathy (DN). Signs and symptoms of DN are sharp pains, numbness, and tangling. Many patterns of nerve injuries could happen during DN but distal symmetric polyneuropathy (DSP) is most common. On the other hand, network analysis is a useful tool to assess incidences and progression of diseases.
Methods: Expression of different genes in diabetic patients with and without progressive neuropathy of surreal nerve (GSE24290) is considered as including data. GEO2R was applied to first step analysis to find the significant differentially expressed genes (DEGs).  The queried significant DEGs plus 100 first neighbors were included in a network by Cytoscape software. The network was analyzed by Network analyzed application of Cytoscape and the central nodes were determined.
Results: The total 26 significant DEGs plus 100 first neighbors were interacted to form the network. INS, ALB, AKT1, APP, SNAP25, NEFL, GFAP, IL6, NEFM, TNF, MAPT, GAP43, and MBP were identified as 13 hubs of the network. NEFL and NEFM were highlighted as the queried hub genes. Insulin as the top hub node was determined among all interacted genes (the queried and added genes).
Conclusions: INS, NEFL, and NEFM are key genes in DN which are involve in metabolism regulation and intra cellular transportation into axons and denderites respectively.