CircRNA Expression Profiles and the Potential Role of CircZFP644 in Mice With Severe Acute Pancreatitis via Sponging miR-21-3p

Yi Yang; Jiandong Ren; Qilin Huang; Jun Wu; Xiaohui Yuan; Wen Jiang; Yi Wen; Lijun Tang; Hongyu Sun

doi:10.3389/fgene.2020.00206

CircRNA Expression Profiles and the Potential Role of CircZFP644 in Mice With Severe Acute Pancreatitis via Sponging miR-21-3p

Front Genet. 2020 Mar 12:11:206. doi: 10.3389/fgene.2020.00206. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Yi Yang^{1

2}, Jiandong Ren³, Qilin Huang^{1

2}, Jun Wu^{1

2}, Xiaohui Yuan^{1

2}, Wen Jiang^{1

2}, Yi Wen¹, Lijun Tang^{1

2}, Hongyu Sun¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of General Surgery & Pancreatic Injury and Repair Key Laboratory of Sichuan Province, The General Hospital of Western Theater Command (Chengdu Military General Hospital), Chengdu, China.
² College of Medicine, Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu, China.
³ School of Medicine, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, China.

Abstract

Severe acute pancreatitis (SAP) is the most serious type of pancreatitis with high morbidity and mortality. The underlying mechanism behind SAP pathogenesis is complex and remains elusive. Circular RNAs (circRNAs) are emerging as vital regulators of gene expression in various diseases by sponging microRNAs (miRNAs). However, the roles of circRNAs in the pathophysiology of SAP remain unknown. In the present study, next-generation RNA sequencing was utilized to identify circRNA transcripts in the pancreatic tissues from three SAP mice and three matched normal tissues. The differentially expressed circRNAs were confirmed by real-time PCR, and the biological functions of their interaction with miRNAs and mRNAs were analyzed. Our results demonstrate that 56 circRNAs were differentially expressed in SAP mice compared with normal controls. Six differentially expressed circRNAs were confirmed with the sequencing data. Importantly, we characterized a significantly downregulated circRNA derived from the ZFP664 gene in SAP. CircZFP644 was found to be negatively correlated with miR-21-3p, with a perfectly matched binding sequence to miR-21-3p. In conclusion, CircZFP644 may play an important role in the pathogenesis of SAP through sponging miR-21-3p. Our findings may provide novel insights regarding the workings of the pathophysiological mechanism of SAP and offer novel targets for SAP.

Keywords: CircZFP644; RNA-seq; ceRNA; circRNA; miR-21; miRNA; severe acute pancreatitis.