ABSTRACT
Aim: It is already known that miRNAs can be differentially expressed in Alzheimer's disease (AD). We aimed to evaluate the performance of miRNAs from blood as potential biomarkers for AD. Materials & methods: MEDLINE, PubMed and Embase were searched for studies about peripheral blood miRNAs that could discriminate patients with AD from cognitively normal controls. The data regarding the specificity and sensitivity were extracted. STATA 14.0 was used to analyze the data. Results: Ten studies containing 770 AD and 664 normal controls. The analysis showed that miRNAs presented excellent diagnostic performance and the overall sensitivity was 0.80 (95% CI: 0.75-0.83), specificity was 0.83 (95% CI: 0.78-0.87) and diagnostic odds ratio was 14 (95% CI: 11-19). Subgroup analysis suggested that the Caucasian group and blood group showed a better performance in AD diagnosis and the diagnostic odds ratio was 42 and 34, respectively. Conclusion: This meta-analysis showed that miRNAs may be a promising biomarkers for AD.
Subject(s)
Alzheimer Disease/blood , MicroRNAs/blood , Alzheimer Disease/diagnosis , Amyloid beta-Peptides/blood , Biomarkers/blood , Humans , Odds RatioABSTRACT
In addition to original role of lowering cholesterol, statins display multiple neuroprotective mechanisms. In this study, 6-Hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA)-treated pheochromocytoma-12 (PC12) cells were used to investigate the neuroprotective nature of lovastatin. After incubation with 6-OHDA and/or lovastatin, test kits were used to detect the levels of LDH and glutamate, which were released from PC12 cells exposed to different culture media. The mRNA levels of TNF-α, and NMDAR1 were determined by RT-PCR and the protein levels were analyzed by western blot. Our results show that lovastatin significantly decreased both the mRNA and the protein levels of TNF-α and NMDAR1. ELISA assays revealed increased lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) and glutamate binding activity in 6-OHDA-lesioned PC12 cells, and this increase could be prevented by lovastatin. Our results suggest that lovastatin induces neuroprotection by inhibiting NMDAR1 and TNF-α. The data provide direct evidence of the potential application of lovastatin for the treatment of parkinson's diseases.
