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Circulating microRNA-144-3p and miR-762 are novel biomarkers of Graves’ disease

Endocrine volume 65, pages 102–109 (2019)Cite this article

Abstract

Purpose

Recently, it has been confirmed that circulating miRNAs play an important role in disease pathogenesis and can be biomarkers of many autoimmune diseases. However, the knowledge about circulating miRNAs in Graves’ disease (GD) is very limited. In this study, we aimed to identify circulating miRNAs as potential biomarkers of GD.

Methods

We recruited 68 participants who met the criteria for GD and healthy controls. The expression profile of miRNAs in plasma was detected using microarrays. We found five interesting miRNAs were differentially expressed between GD and control group and futher validated their relative expression by quantitative real-time PCR. According to their putative target genes predicted by the TargetScan database, we also performed Gene ontology (GO) and Kyoto encyclopedia of genes and genomes (KEGG) analyses to predict their potential functions and related pathways.

Results

Microarray data showed that five miRNAs were differentially expressed in GD and control plasma samples. Among them, miR-16-1-3p, miR-122-5p, miR-221-3p, and miR-762 were upregulated in GD (P < 0.001). In validation stage, we found miR-144-3p was significantly decreased and miR-762 was markedly upregulated in GD plasma (P < 0.01). In addition, miR-762 expression was positively associated with levels of FT3 (r = 0.307, P = 0.038) as well as TRAb (r = 0.302, P = 0.042). The receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis showed that both miR-144-3p and miR-762 displayed good sensitivity and specificity in discriminating the GD patients from the rest of subjects with the area under the ROC curve (AUC) of 0.761 (P = 0.001, 95% CI = 0.648–0.875) and 0.737 (P = 0.001, 95% CI = 0.618–0.857), respectively. Combination of miR-144-3p and miR-762 could better discriminate GD patients from healthy controls with AUC of 0.861 (P < 0.001, 95% CI = 0.775–0.947).

Conclusions

We first demonstrated that aberrant levels of plasmic miR-144-3p and miR-762 were associated with GD, which may be biomarkers for GD diagnosis.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank all of the participants who took part in the studies.

Funding

This project was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos 81670722 and 81873636), and Natural Science Foundation of Shanghai (18ZR1433800).

Author information

Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Qiuming Yao, Xuan Wang

Affiliations

  1. Department of Endocrinology, Jinshan Hospital of Fudan University, No. 1508 Longhang Road, Jinshan District, Shanghai, 201508, China

    Qiuming Yao, Xuan Wang & Bin Wang

  2. Department of Endocrinology, Affiliated Hospital of Yanan University, Shanxi, 716000, China

    Weiwei He

  3. Department of Urology, Jinshan Hospital of Fudan University, No. 1508 Longhang Road, Jinshan District, Shanghai, 201508, China

    Zhenyu Song

  4. Department of Endocrinology, Shanghai University of Medicine & Health Sciences Affiliated Zhoupu Hospital, Shanghai, 201318, China

    Jinan Zhang & Qiu Qin

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  1. Qiuming Yao
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Correspondence to Jinan Zhang or Qiu Qin.

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This work was approved by the Ethics Committee of Jinshan Hospital, Fudan University. Written informed consents were obtained from all participants.

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Yao, Q., Wang, X., He, W. et al. Circulating microRNA-144-3p and miR-762 are novel biomarkers of Graves’ disease. Endocrine 65, 102–109 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12020-019-01884-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12020-019-01884-2

Keywords

  • Graves’ disease
  • MicroRNA
  • Plasma
  • Biomarker