Analysis Summary


Summary of the sex variable inclusion found during the review of studies on each organism.
A) Out of 49 Hsa studies 24 studies(49%) properly specified the sex of the samples, 51% of the studies lacked this information, only 20.5% of the studies used samples of both sexes in the experimental procedure.
B) In Mmu, 51% of the studies presented information about the sex, but focused mainly in male samples, almost no female samples were found in these studies. Only one study included samples of both sexes.

Homo sapiens


Summary of the number of female and male samples found in each Hsa study.

Mus musculus


Summary of the number of female and male samples found in each Mmu study.

Platform Description N elegible studies N selected studies N Adipose samples
Any Female Male
Homo sapiens GPL570 Affymetrix Human Genome U133 Plus 2.0 Array 37 20 1058 445 132
GPL6244 Affymetrix Human Gene 1.0 Arraytranscript (gene) version 15 13 343 144 26
GPL10558 Illumina HumanHT-12 V4.0expression BeadChip 14 7 498 88 144
GPL6947 Illumina HumanHT-12 V3.0expression BeadChip 12 9 825 198 379
TOTAL 78 49 2774 875 681



Platform Description N elegible studies N selected studies N Adipose samples
Any Female Male
Mus musculus GPL1261 Affymetrix Mouse Genome430 2.0 Array 34 16 280 24 165
GPL6246 Affymetrix Mouse Gene 1.0 ST Array transcript (gene) version 24 6 133 10 51
GPL6887 Illumina MouseWG-6 v2.0 expression BeadChip 20 8 183 0 64
GPL6885 Illumina MouseRef-8 v2.0 expression BeadChip 15 8 375 0 243
GPL16570 Affymetrix Mouse Gene 2.0 ST Array transcript (gene) version 10 5 101 0 36
TOTAL 103 43 1072 34 559



A: Ranking of stability levels for the classic housekeeping group evaluated in females and males of Homo sapiens. For each of the selected genes, its position in the ranking is described on the X-axis. This ranking has been generated resuming by the mean the obtained RP values of the three statistics (C.V., IQR/median and MAD/median) after filtering the non-coding genes. Ranking based on 18973 genes.
B: Ranking of stability levels for the classic housekeeping group evaluated in Mus musculus. This ranking has been generated resuming by the mean the obtained RP values of the three statistics (C.V., IQR/median and MAD/median). Ranking based on 47203 genes.


MetaRanking of stability levels housekeeping genes mentioned in this work for human males and females. The dot shape indicates whether they are classical HKG (star) or new putative HKGs proposed (circle). Color indicates if a gene is stable for both sexes (green), stable only in females (violet), stable only in males (red) or not stable (black). Dashed line indicates the limit position of the top 10% most stable genes and with an expression of at least 20 TPM.

Proposed gene Relative stability in males Relative stability in females Expression level (TPM) TPM in females TPM in males
PPIA 873 1589 234.597 236.1 233.6
RPL19 1129.67 137.33 1707.61 1707 1708
RPS8 194.67 178.33 952.191 944.5 957.9
RPS18 119.33 296.33 3173.82 3180 3168
UBB 228 79 252.293 249.8 254.1
UBC 267.33 706.33 432.547 396.9 447.7


Selection of housekeeping candidate genes proposed to be used as a reference to compare both sexes in gene expression analysis. PPIA and RPL19 have been experimentally validated, RPS8, RPS18, UBB and UBC are computationally suggested. These genes are proposed based on their sex-specific values of relative expression stability, obtained from the final MetaRanking positions, and the expression levels have been extracted from GTEx, given in TPM (Transcripts Per Million) , which are high enough to be detected by different technologies.

Proposed gene Relative stability in males Relative stability in females Expression level (TPM) TPM in females TPM in males
ANXA2 396.67 8968 283.997 271.1 291.1
DDX39B 68 6633.67 197.455 192.5 201.9
PLIN4 584.33 11594.67 499.806 441.3 530.7
DNASE2 9911.33 349.33 38.042 37.54 38.25
NDUFB11 6168 412.67 144.795 146.7 143.9
RARA 8267.67 306 42.575 41.94 43.71


Selection of housekeeping candidate genes proposed to be used as sex-specific reference in gene expression analysis. These genes are proposed based on their sex-specific values of relative expression stability, obtained from the final MetaRanking positions, and the expression levels have been extracted from GTEx, given in TPM (Transcripts Per Million), which are high enough to be detected by different technologies.