Association between miRNAs expression and cognitive performances of Pediatric Multiple Sclerosis patients: A pilot study.
Brain Behav
; 9(2): e01199, 2019 02.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-30656857
ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION:
The Pediatric onset of Multiple Sclerosis (PedMS) occurs in up to 10% of all cases. Cognitive impairment is one of the frequent symptoms, exerting severe impact in patients' quality of life and school performances. The underlying pathogenic mechanisms are not fully understood, and molecular markers predictive of cognitive dysfunctions need to be identified. On these grounds, we searched for molecular signature/s (i.e., miRNAs and target genes) associated with cognitive impairment in a selected population of PedMS patients. Additionally, changes of their regional brain volumes associated with the miRNAs of interest were investigated.METHODS:
Nineteen PedMS subjects received a full cognitive evaluation; total RNA from peripheral blood samples was processed by next-generation sequencing followed by a bioinformatics/biostatistics analysis.RESULTS:
The expression of 11 miRNAs significantly correlated with the scores obtained at different cognitive tests; among the others, eight miRNAs correlated with the Trail Making Tests. The computational target prediction identified 337 genes targeted by the miRNAs of interest; a tangled network of molecular connections was hypothesized, where genes like BST1, NTNG2, SPTB, and STAB1, already associated with cognitive dysfunctions, were nodes of the net. Furthermore, the expression of some miRNAs significantly correlated with cerebral volumes, for example, four miRNAs with the cerebellum cortex.CONCLUSIONS:
As far as we know, this is the first evaluation exploring miRNAs in the cognitive performances of PedMS. Although none of these results survived the multiple tests' corrections, we believe that they may represent a step forward the identification of biomarkers useful for monitoring and targeting the onset/progression of cognitive impairments in MS.Key words
Full text:
1
Collection:
01-internacional
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Quality of Life
/
Cognition
/
MicroRNAs
/
Cognitive Dysfunction
/
Multiple Sclerosis
Type of study:
Diagnostic_studies
/
Prognostic_studies
/
Risk_factors_studies
Aspects:
Patient_preference
Limits:
Child
/
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
Language:
En
Journal:
Brain Behav
Year:
2019
Document type:
Article