The role of long non-coding RNA MALAT1 in patients with bipolar disorder

Bipolar disorders are known as chronic, recurrent, and heterogenic diseases. Regarding, diagnosis and treatment of them are very complex. The molecular mechanism and pathophysiology of bipolar disorder are slightly known. Accordingly, long noncoding RNAs are considered as one of the main factors that are dysfunctional in many diseases such as the nervous system diseases. Hence, we aim to investigate the expression of two long non coding RNAs, MALAT1 and UCA1, in patients in bipolar disorder. The levels of MALAT1 and UCA1 lncRNA were evaluated in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) of 50 bipolar patients and 50 healthy controls with real-time PCR. Also, ROC curve analysis and correlation analysis were performed between the gene expression and some clinical features of bipolar individuals. The significant decline of MALAT1 expression level was found in the patients compared to controls; but no significant difference was observed in the UCA1 expression level between the patients and controls. Furthermore, computational analysis of CpG Islands and miRNAs binding sites on LncRNAs, MALAT1, and UCA1 was conducted. Also, The ROC curve area (AUC) of MALAT1 was 0.80. The current results suggest that the expression level of MALAT1 could serve as a potential diagnostic biomarker for bipolar patients.