SummaryLectin-like oxidized LDL receptor-1 (LOX-1) is a surface scavenger receptor for oxidized low-density lipoprotein (oxLDL). Several transcription factors have been reported to regulate LOX-1 expression. MicroRNAs are small noncoding RNAs that control gene expression, but there have been no reports of LOX-1 expression being regulated by microRNAs. Because the microRNA let-7g has been predicted to bind to LOX-1 mRNA, we investigated whether let-7g can regulate LOX-1 expression. Our experiments first demonstrated that oxLDL can reduce let-7g expression. We later confirmed that there is a let-7g binding site on the 39-untranslated region of LOX-1 mRNA. We showed that intracellular Ca 2+ -activated protein kinase C is involved in the oxLDL-LOX-1-let-7g pathway. Bioinformatics predicted that the let-7g promoter has a binding site for the transcriptional repressor OCT-1. We used a promoter assay and chromatin immunoprecipitation to confirm this binding. Consequently, knockdown of OCT-1 was found to increase let-7g expression. Transfection of let-7g inhibited oxLDL-induced LOX-1 and OCT-1 expression, cell proliferation and migration. Mice fed with a high-fat diet showed a decrease in let-7g and an increase in LOX-1 and OCT-1. A study on humans showed the serum levels of let-7g are lower in subjects with hypercholesterolemia compared with normal controls. Our findings identify a negative feedback regulation between let-7g and LOX-1, and indicate that let-7g could be a target to treat cardiovascular disease.

These results suggest that metabolic syndrome is an independent risk factor for sudden sensorineural hearing loss in Taiwan. Vertigo and total hearing loss were indicators of a poor outcome in sudden sensorineural hearing loss.

Kawasaki disease (KD) is characterized by systemic vasculitis with unknown etiology. Previous studies from Japan indicated that a gene polymorphism of ITPKC (rs28493229) is responsible for susceptibility to KD. We collected DNA samples from 1,531 Taiwanese subjects (341 KD patients and 1,190 controls) for genotyping ITPKC. In this study, no significant association was noted for the ITPKC polymorphism (rs28493229) between the controls and KD patients, although the CC genotype was overrepresented. We further combined our data with previously published case/control KD studies in the Taiwanese population and performed a meta-analysis. A significant association between rs28493229 and KD was found (Odds Ratio:1.36, 95% Confidence Interval 1.12–1.66). Importantly, a significant association was obtained between rs28493229 and KD patients with aneurysm formation (P = 0.001, under the recessive model). Taken together, our results indicated that C-allele of ITPKC SNP rs28493229 is associated with the susceptibility and aneurysm formation in KD patients in a Taiwanese population.

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is one of the leading malignant cancers with a rapid increase in incidence and mortality. The recurrences of CRC after curative resection are sometimes unavoidable and often take place within the first year after surgery. MicroRNAs may serve as biomarkers to predict early recurrence of CRC, but identifying them from over 1,400 known human microRNAs is challenging and costly. An alternative approach is to analyze existing expression data of messenger RNAs (mRNAs) because generally speaking the expression levels of microRNAs and their target mRNAs are inversely correlated. In this study, we extracted six mRNA expression data of CRC in four studies (GSE12032, GSE17538, GSE4526 and GSE17181) from the gene expression omnibus (GEO). We inferred microRNA expression profiles and performed computational analysis to identify microRNAs associated with CRC recurrence using the IMRE method based on the MicroCosm database that includes 568,071 microRNA-target connections between 711 microRNAs and 20,884 gene targets. Two microRNAs, miR-29a and miR-29c, were disclosed and further meta-analysis of the six mRNA expression datasets showed that these two microRNAs were highly significant based on the Fisher p-value combination (p = 9.14×10−9 for miR-29a and p = 1.14×10−6 for miR-29c). Furthermore, these two microRNAs were experimentally tested in 78 human CRC samples to validate their effect on early recurrence. Our empirical results showed that the two microRNAs were significantly down-regulated (p = 0.007 for miR-29a and p = 0.007 for miR-29c) in the early-recurrence patients. This study shows the feasibility of using mRNA profiles to indicate microRNAs. We also shows miR-29a/c could be potential biomarkers for CRC early recurrence.

We elaborated the relationship among myopia development, SNP rs662702, microRNA-328 and RA. The data imply that reduction of miR-328 and/or RA can be potential strategies for myopia prevention or treatment.

Immune dysregulation may be involved in the development of endometriosis. The anti-inflammatory cytokine IL-10 plays an important role in eliminating unwanted cells and cellular debris in a silent way. We investigated the modulatory role of IL-10 in the development of endometriosis. We observed that the serum level of IL-10 in patients with endometriosis was significantly higher than that in healthy subjects or in control subjects with other gynecological disease. Monocyte-derived dendritic cells acquired from male donors and subsequently conditioned with serum from women with endometriosis exhibited a tolerogenic phenotype, including increased IL-10 production, lower IL-12 secretion, and down-regulation of CD86 and HLA-DR molecules. Depletion of IL-10 activity in a C57BL/6 mouse model of surgically induced endometriosis significantly decreased the size of endometrial lesions. In contrast, IL-10 administration promoted the growth of endometrial lesions in this model. In addition, infiltrated plasmacytoid dendritic cells were the primary IL-10-secreting immune cells in endometrial lesions. Our findings suggest that IL-10 may suppress immunity against endometrial implants, contributing to development of endometriosis.

The level of global DNA methylation may be related to the cerebrovascular disease. The methylation level of Long Interspersed Nucleotide Element 1 (LINE-1) can represent the global methylation level. We investigated the association between the methylation levels of LINE-1 and ischemic stroke in Chinese. Two hundred and eighty patients of ischemic stroke and 280 age- and sex-matched controls were enrolled. The mean percentage of three CpG sites of LINE-1 was calculated for each subject and was used for analysis. Twenty four samples were re-checked for reproducibility of the methylation assay. Multivariate regression model was used to estimate the odds ratio of stroke risk for one percent change of methylation. Sex-specific analysis was also conducted. Thirty-two cases and 11 controls did not pass the methylation assay criteria, and were excluded from further analysis. The intra-class correlation has a coefficient of 0.97 for the methylation assay. The stroke cases had a lower methylation level than controls (p=0.002), especially male subjects (p=0.001). Sex-specific analysis showed that a decrease of 1% methylation level in men could increase a stroke risk by 1.2-fold after adjusting for other risk factors. LINE-1 methylation levels did not have a significant association with stroke in women. The present study shows that a lower level of LINE-1 methylation was associated with a higher risk for ischemic stroke in men, but methylation level in women did not affect the stroke risk. Our finding in Chinese is consistent with a previous result based on elderly white men.

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