Conserved MicroRNAs in Human Nasopharynx Tissue Samples from Swabs Are Differentially Expressed in Response to SARS-CoV-2

• Published in: Genes Vol. 13; no. 2; p. 348
• Main Authors: Eichmeier, Ales, Kiss, Tomas, Kocanova, Maria, Hakalova, Eliska, Spetik, Milan, Cechova, Jana, Tichy, Boris
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI AG 14.02.2022; MDPI
• Subjects: Coronaviruses; COVID-19 - pathology; COVID-19 - virology; Down-Regulation; Gene expression; Genomes; Genomics; High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing; Humans; Infections; MicroRNAs; MicroRNAs - chemistry; MicroRNAs - metabolism; miRNA; Nasopharynx; Nasopharynx - metabolism; Nasopharynx - virology; Polymerase chain reaction; Post-transcription; Principal Component Analysis; Proteins; Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction; Ribonucleic acid; RNA; RNA, Viral - metabolism; SARS-CoV-2 - genetics; SARS-CoV-2 - isolation & purification; SARS-CoV-2 - physiology; Sequence Analysis, RNA; Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2; Software; Transcriptome; Up-Regulation; Variance analysis; Denmark; United States > US; Germany; Aarhus Denmark; SARS-CoV-2; mir-21; miRNAs; real-time RT-PCR; small RNA sequencing
• ISSN: 2073-4425; 2073-4425
• DOI: 10.3390/genes13020348

The use of high-throughput small RNA sequencing is well established as a technique to unveil the miRNAs in various tissues. The miRNA profiles are different between infected and non-infected tissues. We compare the SARS-CoV-2 positive and SARS-CoV-2 negative RNA samples extracted from human nasopharynx tissue samples to show different miRNA profiles. We explored differentially expressed miRNAs in response to SARS-CoV-2 in the RNA extracted from nasopharynx tissues of 10 SARS-CoV-2-positive and 10 SARS-CoV-2-negative patients. miRNAs were identified by small RNA sequencing, and the expression levels of selected miRNAs were validated by real-time RT-PCR. We identified 943 conserved miRNAs, likely generated through posttranscriptional modifications. The identified miRNAs were expressed in both RNA groups, NegS and PosS: miR-148a, miR-21, miR-34c, miR-34b, and miR-342. The most differentially expressed miRNA was miR-21, which is likely closely linked to the presence of SARS-CoV-2 in nasopharynx tissues. Our results contribute to further understanding the role of miRNAs in SARS-CoV-2 pathogenesis, which may be crucial for understanding disease symptom development in humans.