Circulating MiRNA biomarkers serve as a fingerprint for diabetic atherosclerosis

Type 2 diabetes mellitus induced atherosclerosis (DA) is regarded as a major cause of disability and death in diabetic patients. The early prediction of atherosclerosis in patients DM is necessary. Therefore, we aimed to identify special plasma microRNAs that can serve as a novel non-invasive screening signature of DA patients with atherosclerosis and test its specificity and sensitivity in the early diagnosis of DA. In total, we obtained plasma samples from 285 diabetic atherosclerosis patients and matched diabetic retinopathy (DR) patients, diabetic nephropathy (DN) patients, diabetes mellitus without complication (DM) and healthy controls. An initial screening of miRNA expression was performed through TaqMan Low Density Array (TLDA). Three miRNAs were significantly increased in patients with DA compared with other groups after the multiple stages. The areas under the receiver operating characteristic (AUC) curves of the validated three-plasma miRNAs signature in DA comparing with NC were 0.881, 0.709 and 0.842 while the merged was 0.940 while DA comparing with DM was 0.879, 0.663, 0.731 and the merged was 0.928. The three miRNA could also distinguish DA from DN with an AUC of 0.894, 0.782, 0.910 and 0.963 (merged) as well as from DR with an AUC of 0.876, 0.815, 0.850 and 0.925 (merged). In conclusion, these data provide evidence that plasma miRNAs have the potential to be sensitive, cost-effective biomarkers for the early detection of DA. These biomarkers could serve as a dynamic monitoring factor for detecting the progression of DA from DR, DN, DM patients.