Expression of microRNA related to bone remodeling regulation in plasma in patients with acromegaly

Abstract

Backgraund. MiсroRNA are small regulatory factors that regulate gene expression by post-transcriptional regulation of mRNA, playing an important role in numerous cellular processes including organogenesis, apoptosis, cell proliferation and differentiation. Acromegaly causes bone fragility, but the pathogenetic mechanism is generally unknown.
 Aim. To evaluate levels of microRNA related to bone remodeling regulation in plasma samples from patients with acromegaly
 Materials and methods. Fasting plasma samples were taken and stored in aliquot at -80C from consecutive subjects with clinically evident and biochemically confirmed active acromegaly and healthy volunteers matched by age, sex and body mass index (BMI). miRNeasy Serum/Plasma Kit, TaqMan Advanced miRNA cDNA Synthesis Kit, TaqMan Advanced miRNA Assays were used to assay plasma miRNA expression. Insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF1) was measured by immunochemiluminescence assay (Liaison).
 Results. We enrolled 40 subjects 22 patients suffered from acromegaly and 18 matched healthy controls) matched by sex, age and BMI. The median age of patients with acromegaly was 42 years (Q25;Q75 37;43) with no difference among the groups, p=0.205; BMI 28 (24;32) kg/m2, p=0.253. The median IGF1 in subjects with acromegaly 622 (514;1000) ng/ml was significantly higher as compared to the control group (p0.001). Patients with acromegaly had significantly higher expression of microRNA-100-5р (p=0.051), microRNA-550а-5р (p=0.048), microRNA-7b-5р (p=0.005) and microRNA-96-5р (p=0.042) among 27 bone-specific microRNA tested in plasma
 Conclusions. This study reveals that several microRNAs, known to regulate bone remodeling can be detected in plasma samples of patients with acromegaly and may be suggested as biomarkers for skeletal involvement in patients with acromegaly.