Identification of aberrant circulating miRNAs in Parkinson's disease plasma samples

OBJECTIVE: To detect the aberrant expression of circulating miRNAs and explore the potential early diagnostic biomarkers in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD). METHODS: Plasma samples were collected from 25 treatment‐naïve PD‐diagnosed patients and 25 healthy controls followed by a real‐time PCR‐based miRNA screening analysis of neuron disease‐related miRNAs. RESULTS: A subset of miRNAs with aberrant expression levels in the plasma of PD‐diagnosed patients were identified including upregulation of miR‐27a and downregulation of let‐7a, let‐7f, miR‐142‐3p, and miR‐222 with the AUC values more than 0.8 derived from the receiver operating characteristic curves. CONCLUSIONS: The high sensitivity and specificity of the circulating miRNAs may enable early diagnosis of PD. The study provides a group of novel miRNA candidates for detecting PD.