Profile of MicroRNAs Differentially Produced in Hearts from Patients with Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy and Sarcomeric Mutations

Abstract

To the Editor: MicroRNAs (miRNAs)1 regulate cardiac growth and conduction and play an important role in cardiac diseases (1). Several miRNAs are differentially produced in cardiac hypertrophic tissue, compared with normal tissue, and may contribute to the development of cardiomyocyte hypertrophy (2, 3). Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) is frequently familial and caused by mutations in sarcomeric genes. To our knowledge, no study has reported the miRNA production profile in HCM tissues with sarcomeric gene mutations. To better define the molecular changes in HCM, we defined the production of well-characterized miRNAs in left ventricular (LV) heart tissue from 5 patients who underwent a cardiac transplantation and a control heart tissue (human LV tissue, Ambion/Applied Biosystems), and we compared their production profiles. Two of the patients were familial HCM patients who were carriers of missense mutations in the MYH7 2 (myosin, heavy chain 7, cardiac muscle, beta) gene (Val822Met and Arg453Cys). Three patients were cases of sporadic LV hypertrophy secondary to heart valve disease. The study was approved by the Ethical Committee of Hospital Universitario Central Asturias (HUCA), and all of the patients provided written informed consent. We isolated total RNA with TRIzol (Invitrogen) and …