The axis of long non-coding RNA MALAT1/miR-1-3p/CXCR4 is dysregulated in patients with diabetic neuropathy

Donya Ashjari; Negin Karamali; Misagh Rajabinejad; Seyedeh Sara Hassani; Leila Afshar Hezarkhani; Daryoush Afshari; Ali Gorgin Karaji; Farhad Salari; Alireza Rezaiemanesh

doi:10.1016/j.heliyon.2022.e09178

The axis of long non-coding RNA MALAT1/miR-1-3p/CXCR4 is dysregulated in patients with diabetic neuropathy

Heliyon. 2022 Mar 24;8(3):e09178. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2022.e09178. eCollection 2022 Mar.

Authors

Donya Ashjari^{1

2}, Negin Karamali^{1

2}, Misagh Rajabinejad^{3

4}, Seyedeh Sara Hassani^{1

2}, Leila Afshar Hezarkhani⁵, Daryoush Afshari⁵, Ali Gorgin Karaji², Farhad Salari², Alireza Rezaiemanesh²

Affiliations

¹ Student Research Committee, School of Medicine, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran.
² Department of Immunology, School of Medicine, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran.
³ Student Research Committee, School of Medicine, Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, Sari, Iran.
⁴ Department of Immunology, School of Medicine, Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, Sari, Iran.
⁵ Department of Neurology, School of Medicine, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran.

Abstract

Background: Diabetic neuropathy (DN) is a prevalent complication of diabetes mellitus characterized by pain and inflammation. Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) have been associated with DN. This study aimed to investigate transcript levels of Metastasis-associated lung adenocarcinoma transcript 1 (MALAT1), microRNA (miR)-1-3p, and C-X-C motif chemokine receptor 4 (CXCR4) in the DN patients and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) cases without neuropathy.

Methods: Here, 20 cases with DN and 20 T2DM subjects without neuropathy (as the control group) were included. Total RNA was extracted from peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) of all participants. The expression levels of targets were evaluated by Real-time-PCR.

Results: Results showed that MALAT1 (Fold change = 2.47, P = 0.03) and CXCR4 (Fold change = 1.65, P = 0.023) were significantly upregulated, while miR-1-3p was downregulated (Fold change = 0.9, P = 0.028) in whole blood samples from DN patients compared to the control group. A significant correlation was found between transcript levels of MALAT1 and CXCR4 (rho = 0.84; P < 0.0001).

Conclusions: This study suggests a possible involvement of the MALAT1/miR-1-3p/CXCR4 axis in the pathogenesis of DN.

Keywords: CXCR4; Diabetic neuropathy; MALAT1; miR-1-3p.