Recent studies provide evidence of correlations of DNA methylation and expression of protein-coding genes with human aging. The relations of microRNA expression with age and age-related clinical outcomes have not been characterized thoroughly. We explored associations of age with whole-blood microRNA expression in 5221 adults and identified 127 microRNAs that were differentially expressed by ag...

We describe an update of the miRBase database (http://www.mirbase.org/), the primary microRNA sequence repository. The latest miRBase release (v20, June 2013) contains 24 521 microRNA loci from 206 species, processed to produce 30 424 mature microRNA products. The rate of deposition of novel microRNAs and the number of researchers involved in their discovery continue to increase, driven largely...

Many studies have shown that the pathogenesis of liver injury includes oxidative stress. MicroRNA-122 may be a marker for the early diagnosis of drug-induced liver injury. However, the relationship between microRNA-122 and oxidative stress in anti-tuberculosis drug-induced liver injury remains unknown. We measured changes in tissue microRNA-122 levels and indices of oxidative stress during live...

MicroRNAs are small (approximately 22 nt) RNAs that regulate gene expression and play important roles in both normal and disease physiology. The use of microarrays for global characterization of microRNA expression is becoming increasingly popular and has the potential to be a widely used and valuable research tool. However, microarray profiling of microRNA expression raises a number of data an...

MicroRNAs are ubiquitous in plant genomes but vary greatly in their abundance within and conservation among plant lineages. To gain insight into the evolutionary birth/death dynamics of microRNA families, we sequenced small RNA and 5'-end PARE libraries generated from two closely related species of Gossypium. Here, we demonstrate that 33 microRNA families, with similar copy numbers and average ...

MicroRNAs constitute an important class of noncoding, single-stranded, ~22 nucleotide long RNA molecules encoded by endogenous genes. They play an important role in regulating gene transcription and the regulation of normal development. MicroRNAs can be associated with disease; however, only a few microRNA-disease associations have been confirmed by traditional experimental approaches. We intro...

microRNAs represent the best described class of small RNAs (21-23nt) and have been shown to function as post-transcriptional regulators of gene expression. The high relative stability of microRNA in common clinical samples such as serum/plasma, urine and other biofluids, and the ability of micro RNA expression profiles to accurately classify discrete tissue types and specific disease states hav...

MicroRNAs are emerging as new mediators in the regulation of adipose tissue biology and the development of obesity. An important role of microRNA-125a has been suggested in the pathogenesis of insulin resistance (IR). Here, we characterized the function of microRNA-125a in adipose tissue in a context of experimentally-induced IR and obesity in mice and in obese patients. We showed time dependen...

Macrophage infiltration is a hallmark feature of viral myocarditis. As studies have shown that microRNA-155 regulates the differentiation of macrophages, we aimed to investigate the role of microRNA-155 in VM. We report that silencing microRNA-155 protects mice from coxsackievirus B3 induced myocarditis. We found that microRNA-155 expression was upregulated and localized primarily in heart-infi...

The genome expression pattern is strongly modified during the heat shock response (HSR) to form an adaptive state. This may be partly achieved by modulating microRNA levels that control the expression of a great number of genes that are embedded within the gene circuitry. Here, we investigated the cross-talk between two highly conserved and universal house-keeping systems, the HSR and microRNA ...