Lack of associations of microRNAs with severe NAFLD in people living with HIV: discovery case-control study

Mario Frías; Diana Corona-Mata; Jose M Moyano; Angela Camacho-Espejo; Pedro López-López; Javier Caballero-Gómez; Inmaculada Ruiz-Cáceres; María Casares-Jiménez; Ignacio Pérez-Valero; Antonio Rivero-Juárez; Antonio Rivero

doi:10.3389/fendo.2023.1230046

Lack of associations of microRNAs with severe NAFLD in people living with HIV: discovery case-control study

Front Endocrinol (Lausanne). 2023 Sep 22:14:1230046. doi: 10.3389/fendo.2023.1230046. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Mario Frías^{1

2

3}, Diana Corona-Mata¹, Jose M Moyano⁴, Angela Camacho-Espejo^{1

2}, Pedro López-López^{1

2}, Javier Caballero-Gómez^{1

2

3}, Inmaculada Ruiz-Cáceres¹, María Casares-Jiménez¹, Ignacio Pérez-Valero^{1

2}, Antonio Rivero-Juárez^{1

2}, Antonio Rivero^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Unit of Infectious Diseases, Hospital Universitario Reina Sofia, Clinical Virology and Zoonoses, Maimonides Biomedical Research Institute of Cordoba, University of Córdoba, Córdoba, Spain.
² CIBER de Enfermedades Infecciosas, Instituto de Salud Carlos III (CIBERINFEC, ISCIII), Madrid, Spain.
³ Animal Health Department, Animal Health and Zoonoses Research Group (GISAZ), University of Córdoba, Córdoba, Spain.
⁴ Department of Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence, Andalusian Research Institute in Data Science and Computational Intelligence (DaSCI), University of Granada, Granada, Spain.

Abstract

Background & objective: Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is highly prevalent in people living with HIV (PLWH) and the expression of some microRNAs could be useful as biomarkers for the diagnosis of NAFLD. The aim of this study was to identify patterns of differential expression of microRNAs in PLWH and assess their diagnostic value for NALFD.

Methods: A discovery case-control study with PLWH was carried out. The expression of miRNAs was determined using HTG EdgeSeq technology. Cases were defined as patients with severe NAFLD and controls as patients without NAFLD, characterized using the controlled attenuation parameter (CAP). Cases and controls were matched 1:1 for age, sex, BMI, CD4+ lymphocyte count, active HCV infection, and ART regimen.

Results: Serum 2,083 simultaneous microRNA transcripts were analyzed using HTG technology and compared between cases and controls. Forty-five patients, 23 cases, and 22 controls were included in the study. In the analysis of the expression pattern of the 2,083 microRNAs, no differential expression patterns were found between both groups of patients included in the study.

Conclusion: Analysis of the microRNA transcriptome profile of nonobese PLWH with severe NAFLD did not appear to differ from that of patients without NAFLD. Thus, microRNA might not serve as a proper biomarker for predicting severe NALFD in this population.

Keywords: CAP; HIV; NAFLD; PLWH; microRNA; steatosis.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Biomarkers
Case-Control Studies
HIV
HIV Infections* / complications
HIV Infections* / genetics
Humans
MicroRNAs* / genetics
Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease* / complications
Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease* / diagnosis
Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease* / genetics

Substances

MicroRNAs
Biomarkers

Grants and funding

The authors declare financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This work was supported by Secretaría General de Investigación, Desarrollo e Innovación en Salud (PI-0287-2019) for grants for the financing of Investigación, Desarrollo e Innovación Biomédica y en Ciencias de la Salud en Andalucía; the Ministerio de Sanidad (RD12/0017/0012) integrated into the Plan Nacional de I+D+I and co-financed by the ISCIII-Subdirección General de Evaluación and the Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (FEDER); and the Fundación para la Investigación en Salud (FIS) del Instituto Carlos III (Research Project grant numbers: PI18/01270). Antonio Rivero-Juarez is the recipient of a Miguel Servet Research Contract by the Ministerio de Ciencia, Promoción y Universidades of Spain (CP18/00111). C-GJ is supported by the CIBER -Consorcio Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red-(CB21/13/00083), Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación and Unión Europea-NextGenerationEU. C-JM is the recipient of a CONTRATOS PREDOCTORALES DE FORMACIÓN EN INVESTIGACIÓN EN SALUD (PFIS) (FI22/00180) from the Instituto de Salud Carlos III (ISCIII) and co-funded by the European Union. C-MD is the recipient of a Rio-Hortega (CM22/00176) grant from the Instituto de Salud Carlos III (ISCIII) and co-funded by the European Union. MM holds a postdoctoral Juan de la Cierva Formación grant FJC2020-043823-I funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and by European Union NextGenerationEU/PRTR. L-LP is the recipient of a Margarita Salas contract funded by Plan de Recuperación, Transformación y Resiliencia, NextGeneration EU.