Characterization of Circulating Exosomal MicroRNAs and Its Role as Biomarkers for Metabolic Syndrome

Abstract

Exosomal microRNAs have been attracting major interest as potential diagnostic biomarkers for metabolic syndrome. The aim of our study was to characterize the serum exosomes, exosomal miRNA and their target genes to identify those that were altered in relation to different conditions of metabolic syndrome with different forms of treatment to evaluate their use as diagnostic and treatment biomarkers; Eighty male adult albino rats were used in this experiment, 10 served as control group and other 70 divided into 7 different groups, some served as metabolic syndrome models without treatments and others were served as metabolic syndromes models with different treatments. Our results explained that, the expression levels of miR-122, sterol response elementary binding protein-1 (SREBP-1) & fatty acid synthase-1 (FAS-1) were significantly higher in the hepatic tissue of metabolic syndrome model groups than that of control and significantly down-regulated after different treatments but still higher than that of control group while carnitine palmitoyltransferase-1(CPT-1) was significantly decreased in the same groups. Also the expression levels of miR-31 was significantly higher in Adipose tissue of metabolic syndrome model groups than that of control and significantly down-regulated after different treatments but still higher than that of control group while Leptin gene (Ob), Phosphoinositide-3-kinase, class 2, alpha polypeptide (PIK3C2A) and Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-γ (PPAR-γ) were significantly decreased in the same groups. It was concluded that Exosomal miRNA signatures appear to mirror pathological changes of metabolic syndrome patients and several miRNAs are promising biomarkers for non-invasive diagnosis of the disease.