scholarly journals Circulating microRNA-197-3p as a potential biomarker for asbestos exposure

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Francesca Frontini ◽  
Ilaria Bononi ◽  
Elena Torreggiani ◽  
Giulia Di Mauro ◽  
Elisa Mazzoni ◽  
...  

AbstractAsbestos is considered the main cause of diseases in workers exposed to this mineral in the workplace as well as an environmental pollutant. The association between asbestos and the onset of different diseases has been reported, but asbestos exposure specific biomarkers are not known. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small, single-strand, non-coding RNAs, with potential value as diagnostic, prognostic, and predictive markers in liquid biopsies. Sera collected from workers ex-exposed to asbestos (WEA) fibers were compared with sera from healthy subjects (HS) of similar age, as liquid biopsies. The expression of the circulating miRNA 197-3p was investigated employing two different highly analytical PCR methods, i.e. RT-qPCR and ddPCR. MiR-197-3p levels were tested in sera from WEA compared to HS. MiR-197-3p tested dysregulated in sera from WEA (n = 75) compared to HS (n = 62). Indeed, miR-197-3p was found to be 2.6 times down-regulated in WEA vs. HS (p = 0.0001***). In addition, an inverse correlation was detected between miR-197-3p expression level and cumulative asbestos exposure, being this miRNA down-regulated 2.1 times in WEA, with high cumulative asbestos exposure, compared to WEA with low exposure (p = 0.0303*). Circulating miR-197-3p, found to be down regulated in sera from WEA, is proposed as a new potential biomarker of asbestos exposure.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
FRANCESCA FRONTINI ◽  
Ilaria Bononi ◽  
Elena Torreggiani ◽  
Giulia Di Mauro ◽  
Elisa Mazzoni ◽  
...  

Asbestos is considered the main cause of diseases in workers exposed to this mineral in the workplace as well as an environmental pollutant. The association between asbestos and the onset of different diseases has been reported, but asbestos exposure specific biomarkers are not known. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small, single-strand, non-coding RNAs, with potential value as diagnostic, prognostic, and predictive markers in liquid biopsies. Sera collected from workers ex-exposed to asbestos (WEA) fibers were compared with sera from healthy subjects (HS) of similar age, as liquid biopsies. The expression of the circulating miRNA 197-3p was investigated employing two different highly analytical PCR methods, i.e. RT-PCR and dd-PCR. MiR-197-3p levels were tested in sera from WEA compared to HS. MiR-197-3p tested dysregulated in sera from WEA (n=75) compared to HS (n=62). Indeed, miR-197-3p was found to be 2.6 times down-regulated in WEA vs. HS (p=0.0001***). In addition, an inverse correlation was detected between miR-197-3p expression level and cumulative asbestos exposure, being this miRNA down-regulated 2.1 times in WEA, with high cumulative asbestos exposure, compared to WEA with low exposure (p=0.0303*). Circulating miR-197-3p, found to be down regulated in sera from WEA, is proposed as a new potential biomarker of asbestos exposure.


Cancers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (6) ◽  
pp. 1448
Author(s):  
Raquel Herranz ◽  
Julia Oto ◽  
Emma Plana ◽  
Álvaro Fernández-Pardo ◽  
Fernando Cana ◽  
...  

Bladder cancer (BC) is among the most frequent cancer types in the world and is the most lethal urological malignancy. Presently, diagnostic and follow-up methods for BC are expensive and invasive. Thus, the identification of novel predictive biomarkers for diagnosis, progression, and prognosis of BC is of paramount importance. To date, several studies have evidenced that cell-free DNA (cfDNA) found in liquid biopsies such as blood and urine may play a role in the particular scenario of urologic tumors, and its analysis may improve BC diagnosis report about cancer progression or even evaluate the effectiveness of a specific treatment or anticipate whether a treatment would be useful for a specific patient depending on the tumor characteristics. In the present review, we have summarized the up-to-date studies evaluating the value of cfDNA as potential diagnostic, prognostic, or monitoring biomarker for BC in several biofluids.


2020 ◽  
Vol 14 (11) ◽  
pp. 933-941
Author(s):  
Ying Sun ◽  
Wei Wang ◽  
Yue-Ru Jiao ◽  
Jian Ren ◽  
Lei Gao ◽  
...  

Aim: This study aimed to explore the prognostic value of leukocyte telomere length (LTL) in patients with coronary artery disease (CAD). Materials & methods: We enrolled 366 CAD patients and 76 healthy subjects in this study. LTL was measured. All subjects were followed up for 6 months for further analysis regarding major adverse cardiac events (MACEs). Results: CAD patients had a significantly shortened LTL compared with healthy subjects (p < 0.05). The area under the curve for LTL prediction of MACEs was 0.769 (p < 0.001), with a shorter LTL being an independent predictor of MACEs (Cox proportional hazards regression, hazard ratio: 2.866; p < 0.001). Conclusion: LTL could be considered as an independent predictor of short-term MACEs in CAD.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Amin Safa ◽  
Elham Badrlou ◽  
Shahram Arsang-Jang ◽  
Arezou Sayad ◽  
Mohammad Taheri ◽  
...  

Abstract NF-κB signaling pathway has important roles in the regulation of growth and development of nervous system. This pathway has also been shown to participate in the pathogenesis of schizophrenia. Meanwhile, activity of NF-κB signaling pathway is regulated by several factors including non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs). In the current study, we evaluated expression of nine NF-κB-related lncRNAs namely DILC, ANRIL, PACER, CHAST, ADINR, DICER1-AS1, HNF1A-AS1, H19 and NKILA as well as two mRNA coding genes namely ATG5 and CEBPA in the peripheral blood of patients with schizophrenia compared with matched healthy subjects. Expressions of these genes were assessed by real time PCR technique. Expression of PACER was lower in patients with schizophrenia compared with controls (Posterior beta = − 0.684, P value = 0.049). On the other hand, expressions of CHAST, CEBPA, H19, HNF1A-AS1 and DICER1-AS1 were higher in patients compared with controls (Posterior beta = 0.39, P value = 0.005; Posterior beta = 0.844, P value < 0.0001; Posterior beta = 0.467, P value < 0.0001; Posterior beta = 1.107, P value = 0.005; Posterior beta = 0.176, P value = 0.044, respectively). We also appraised the diagnostic power of transcript quantities of CHAST, CEBPA, DICER1-AS1, H19 and HNF1A-AS1 in distinguishing between patients with schizophrenia and controls through depicting ROC curves. Based on the area under curve (AUC) values, CEBPA had the best diagnostic power (AUC = 0.948, P < 0.0001), followed by H19 (AUC = 0.815, P < 0.0001). Taken together, our study demonstrated dysregulation of NF-κB-related lncRNAs and genes in the peripheral blood of patients with schizophrenia and their potential as peripheral markers for this psychiatric condition.


2017 ◽  
Vol 2017 ◽  
pp. 1-8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhaoqiang Jiang ◽  
Shibo Ying ◽  
Wei Shen ◽  
Xianglei He ◽  
Junqiang Chen ◽  
...  

Fibulin-3 has been reported as a potential biomarker for mesothelioma. However, little is known about the diagnostic efficacies of fibulin-3 for asbestos-related diseases (ARDs) in China. This study was to investigate the utility of fibulin-3 for asbestos exposure and ARDs. A total of 430 subjects were recruited from Southeast China, including healthy individuals, asbestos-exposed (AE) individuals, and patients with pleural plaques (PP), asbestosis, and malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM). Plasma fibulin-3 was measured using the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Linear regression analyses were applied to explore the influencing factors of fibulin-3. Receiver operating characteristic curves were used to determine the cutoff values. The median fibulin-3 level of subjects in the mesothelioma group was higher than that in other groups. Subjects in the asbestosis group had higher median fibulin-3 level than those in the control group. A higher fibulin-3 level was found in the group with ≥10 years of asbestos exposure as compared with control groups. The AUCs of fibulin-3 for distinguishing MPM subjects from control, AE, PP, and asbestosis subjects were 0.92, 0.88, 0.90, and 0.81, respectively. Our study provided evidence that fibulin-3 could be a potential biomarker for the early screening of MPM, but not of other nonmalignant ARDs in Chinese populations.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qinghua Liu ◽  
Ying Zhang ◽  
Jiwei Zhang ◽  
Kun Tao ◽  
Brett D Hambly ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Gastric cancer (GC) is a malignancy with high morbidity/mortality, partly due to a lack of reliable biomarkers for early diagnosis. It is important to develop reliable biomarker(s) with specificity, sensitivity and convenience for early diagnosis. The role of tumour-associated macrophages (TAMs) and survival of GC patients are controversial. Macrophage colony stimulating factor (MCSF) regulates monocytes/macrophages. Elevated MCSF is correlated with invasion, metastasis and poor survival of tumour patients. IL-34, a ligand of the MCSF receptor, acts as a “twin” to MCSF, demonstrating overlapping and complimentary actions. IL-34 involvement in tumours is controversial, possibly due to the levels of MCSF receptors. While the IL34/MCSF/MCSFR axis is very important for regulating macrophage differentiation, the specific interplay between these cytokines, macrophages and tumour development is unclear.Methods A multi-factorial evaluation could provide more objective utility, particularly for either prediction and/or prognosis of gastric cancer. Precision medicine requires molecular diagnosis to determine the specifically mutant function of tumours, and is becoming popular in the treatment of malignancy. Therefore, elucidating specific molecular signalling pathways in specific cancers facilitates the success of a precision medicine approach. Gastric cancer tissue arrays were generated from stomach samples with TNM stage, invasion depth and the demography of these patients (n = 185). Using immunohistochemistry/histopathology, MCSF, IL-34 and macrophages were determined.Results We found that IL-34 may serve as a predictive biomarker, but not as an independent, prognostic factor in GC; MCSF inversely correlated with survival of GC in TNM III‑IV subtypes. Increased CD68+TAMs were a good prognostic factor in some cases and could be used as an independent prognostic factor in male T3 stage GC.Conclusion Our data support the potency of IL-34, MCSF, TAMs and the combination of IL34/TAMs as novel biological markers for GC, and may provide new insight for both diagnosis and cellular therapy of GC.


2006 ◽  
Vol 134 (9-10) ◽  
pp. 369-374 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zana Stankovic ◽  
Gordana Nikolic-Balkoski ◽  
Ljubica Leposavic ◽  
Ljiljana Popovic

Introduction: Depression is the most commonly present psychiatric entity in clinical practice, accompanied by significant impairment of both social and professional functioning. In addition, depression frequently develops as complication of other psychiatric disorders and various somatic diseases. Objective: To investigate subjective perception of quality of life and social adjustment, severity of depressive symptoms as well as level of correlation of severity of depressive symptoms and quality of life and social adjustment of patients with recurrent depression in comparison to the group of patients with diabetes and healthy subjects. Method: The study included 45 subjects of both sexes, ranging from 18 to 60 years of age, divided in three groups of 15 subjects each. The experimental group comprised the patients diagnosed with recurrent depression in remission (DSM-IV), one control group was consisted of patients diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes mellitus and another one comprised healthy subjects. The instruments of assessment were: The Beck Depression Inventory- BDI, The Social Adaptation Self -evaluation scale - SASS, The Psychological General Well-Being Scale - WBQ. Results: Significant difference of both BDI and WBQ scales was found between the experimental and the control group of healthy subjects (ANOVA, Mann Whitney; p?0.01), as well as between two control groups (p?0.02). The level of inverse correlation of mean score values of BDI and SASS scales was significant in the control group of patients with diabetes while such levels of BDI and WBQ scales (Spearman correlation coefficient, p<0.01) were found in all groups of our study. Conclusion: In the group of patients with recurrent depression, significant decline of quality of life and significantly higher severity of depressive symptoms were present in comparison to the group of healthy subjects as well as significant level of inverse correlation of severity of depressive symptoms and quality of life.


Author(s):  
Preeti P. Bramhapurkar ◽  
Prabhakar A. Tembhurne ◽  
S. Chandra Sekar ◽  
D. Muthucheven ◽  
Sharvan Sehrawat ◽  
...  

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 ◽  
pp. 1-7
Author(s):  
Md Sayed Ali Sheikh

The present study explored the clinical value of plasma microRNA-21 as a novel biomarker for early prediction of stable and unstable angina patients and its relationship with aging. A total of 255 participants, 123 patients with chronic stable angina, 82 patients with unstable angina, and 50 healthy subjects, were included in our study. Stable coronary and unstable coronary patients were confirmed following AHA/ACC clinical protocols. Total RNA was extracted from plasma by using miRNA-based TRIzol reagent. Plasma miR-21 expression levels were determined by real-time polymerase chain reaction. To evaluate the diagnosis accuracy, the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were used. Plasma microRNA-21 concentration levels were significantly elevated in stable and unstable angina patients as compared with control subjects P<0.001. The area under the ROC curves of circulating microRNA-21 was accurately distinguished in stable angina patients (AUC 0.921) and unstable angina patients (AUC 0.944) from healthy subjects. MicroRNA-21 expression gradually elevated with increasing aging in all the populations. Moreover, the current study also demonstrated that the expression of plasma miR-21 levels was significantly associated with different age groups within healthy subjects and stable and unstable angina patients P<0.001. This research finding suggested that plasma microRNA-21 may be considered as a suitable new biomarker for early detection of stable and unstable angina patients, and it has a strong correlation with aging.


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