Project description:Altered levels of circulating extracellular miRNA in plasma and serum have shown promise as non-invasive biomarkers of disease. However, unlike the assessment of cellular miRNA levels for which there are accepted housekeeping genes, analogous reference controls for normalization of circulating miRNA are lacking. The objective of this study was to devise an approach to both identify and validate circulating miRNA reference controls on a de novo basis, and evaluate the relative performance of these customized internal reference controls versus other strategies. As a case example, 1066 different miRNAs were screened in plasma from pulmonary arterial hypertension patients and control subjects to identify an initial pool of miRNA candidates.
Project description:Altered levels of circulating extracellular miRNA in plasma and serum have shown promise as non-invasive biomarkers of disease. However, unlike the assessment of cellular miRNA levels for which there are accepted housekeeping genes, analogous reference controls for normalization of circulating miRNA are lacking. The objective of this study was to devise an approach to both identify and validate circulating miRNA reference controls on a de novo basis, and evaluate the relative performance of these customized internal reference controls versus other strategies. As a case example, 1066 different miRNAs were screened in plasma from pulmonary arterial hypertension patients and control subjects to identify an initial pool of miRNA candidates. PCR array profiling was performed on 4 treatment-naïve idiopathic pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) patients, 3 healthy control subjects and 1 non-PAH control subject
Project description:To identify the potential biomarkers of Alzheimer's disease (AD) based on circulating microRNAs (miRNAs), we developed a new approach using feature selection and linear mixed model. The miRNA sequencing data of 105 plasma and 112 serum samples from 112 subjects including 28 AD cases, 63 mild cognitive impairment (MCI), and 21 controls were used to identify cerebrospinal fluid biomarkers associated miRNAs. The potential of these miRNAs as biomarkers of AD or MCI was researched and validated via both internal and external dataset. Patient classification was effectuated in compliance with the NIA-AA criteria for “MCI due to AD” and “Dementia due to AD”.
Project description:Background MicroRNA expression is frequently dysregulated in cancer and it could be used potentially as a disease classifier and a prognostic tool in cancer. It has been reported that the cancer associated specific microRNAs were stably detected in blood. The objective of this study was to discover a panel of circulating microRNAs as potential ER+/HER2- breast cancer biomarkers. Methods We compared levels of circulating microRNAs in blood samples from 11 ER+/HER2- advanced breast cancer patients with age-matched 5 control subjects by using microarray-based expression profiling. We validated the level of microRNAs by real-time quantitative polymerase cycle reaction (RT-qPCR) in 40 control subjects, 180 early breast cancer patients (EBC), and 52 metastatic breast cancer patients (MBC). Then, we assessed the association between the levels of microRNA and clinical outcomes of ER+/HER2- metastatic breast cancer. Background MicroRNA expression is frequently dysregulated in cancer and it could be used potentially as a disease classifier and a prognostic tool in cancer. It has been reported that the cancer associated specific microRNAs were stably detected in blood. The objective of this study was to discover a panel of circulating microRNAs as potential ER+/HER2- breast cancer biomarkers. Methods We compared levels of circulating microRNAs in blood samples from 11 ER+/HER2- advanced breast cancer patients with age-matched 5 control subjects by using microarray-based expression profiling. We validated the level of microRNAs by real-time quantitative polymerase cycle reaction (RT-qPCR) in 40 control subjects, 180 early breast cancer patients (EBC), and 52 metastatic breast cancer patients (MBC). Then, we assessed the association between the levels of microRNA and clinical outcomes of ER+/HER2- metastatic breast cancer. Controls: 5 cases; ER +/HER2- breast cancer patients : 11 cases
Project description:We aimed to determine if lung cancer detection can be improved by circulating miRNAs as biomarkers. To this end, we collected blood of over 3000 individuals using PAXgene blood tubes. The individuals were diagnosed with lung cancer (LCa), a non-tumor lung disease (NTLD), another disease (OD) or were healthy controls. For every individual we determined their miRNA expression patterns. Total RNA was extracted with Qiagen PAXgene Blood miRNA Kit, labeled and hybridized with the Agilent miRNA Complete Labeling and Hyb Kit and scanned with Agilent microarray scanner system.
Project description:Plasma samples from 100 early stage (I to IIIA) non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients and 100 non-cancer controls were screened for 754 circulating microRNAs via qRT-PCR, using TaqMan MicroRNA Arrays. Our objective was to identify a panel of circulating microRNAs in plasma that will contribute to early detection of lung cancer.
Project description:Extracellular vesicles such as exosomes are selectively enriched in RNA that has potential for use as disease biomarkers. To systemically characterize circulating extracellular RNA profiles, we performed RNA sequencing analysis on plasma extracellular vesicles derived from 192 individuals including 100 colon cancer, 36 prostate cancer and 6 pancreatic cancer patients along with 50 healthy individuals. Of ~12.6 million raw reads for each of these subjects, the number of mappable reads aligned to RNA references was ~5.4 million including microRNAs(miRNAs) (~40.4%), piwi-interacting RNAs(piwiRNAs) (~40.0%), pseudo-genes (~3.7%), long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) (~2.4%), tRNAs (~2.1%), and mRNAs (~2.1%). To select the best candidates for potential extracellular RNA reference controls, we performed abundant level stability testing and identified a set of miRNAs showing relatively consistent expression. To estimate biological variations, we performed association analysis of expression levels with age and sex in healthy individuals. This analysis showed significant sex association with seven small noncoding RNAs (false discovery rate, or FDR<0.05), while no small noncoding RNAs were statistically associated with age. To identify disease-associated RNA transcripts, we performed analysis of covariance by including disease status, age, sex, RNA isolation and gel size selection dates. We observed a gradual increase of significantly associated RNAs (in particular, miRNAs) with disease advancement as denoted by cancer staging. We found significant association of miR-125a-5p and miR-1246-3p with all cancer types tested (FDR<0.05). Based on the disease associations, we developed cancer type-specific multivariate statistical models to predict disease status with an area under the ROC curve from 0.67 in stage I colon cancer to 0.92 in advanced prostate cancer. To date, this is the largest RNA-seq study to systematically profile extracellular RNA species, which has not only provided a baseline reference profile for circulating extracellular RNA, but also a set of RNA candidates for reference controls and disease biomarkers.
Project description:We developed a R-based script to select internal control genes based solely on read counts and gene sizes. We used this method to pick custom reference genes for the differential expression analysis of three transcriptome sets from transgenic Arabidopsis plants expressing heterologous fungal effector proteins tagged with GFP (using GFP alone as the control). The custom reference genes showed lower covariance and fold change as well as a broader range of expression levels than commonly used reference genes. When analyzed with NormFinder, both typical and custom reference genes were considered suitable internal controls, but the custom selected genes were more stable. geNorm produced a similar result in which most custom selected genes ranked higher (i.e. were more stable) than commonly used reference genes.
Project description:Exercise has been shown to boost cognition in mammals. However, the underlying mechanism remain poorly understood. We hypothesized that circulating microRNAs may correlate to improved cognitive functions, particularly cognitive flexibility after exercise and could be critical for neurons functions. To address this, in our study, healthy human volunteers participated in an exercise paradigm coupled with various cognitive tests performed prior to and after exercise and high quality small RNAome data were generated from total blood collected at two time points (pre- and post-exercise). Advanced comparative computational approaches were employed to select candidate microRNAs and multiple functional experiments were designed to test effect of those candidates on neuronal transcriptome, and neuronal functions. Our analyses revealed a cluster of circulating microRNAs related to improved cognitive flexibility. After rigorous analyses, we selected two candidate microRNAs and inhibition of these microRNAs led to up-regulation of genes, conserved in increased stress responses and downregulation of genes related to synaptic morphology and functions. Functional data revealed that the two microRNAs are indeed critical for maintenance of neuronal functions and morphology. Newly discovered cluster of microRNAs shed light on the mechanism of exercise-improved cognition and the two candidate microRNAs are potential RNA therapeutic target against dementia.