miRNA expression is non-linearly related with NPC patient death risk.

<p><b>A)</b> Illustration of the relationship between normalized miRNA expression and normalized miRNA scores of the selected nine miRNA biomarkers. <b>B)</b> No significant difference was observed in normalized miR-15b expression between patients with survival statuses of ‘alive’ and ‘dead’. Mean ± SEM; <i>p</i> = 0.61. <b>C)</b> The miRNA scores of miR-15b were significantly different when patients with survival statuses of ‘alive’ and ‘dead’ were compared. Mean ± SEM; <i>p</i><0.0001. <b>D)</b> AUROC comparison between the death risk prediction models using miRNA expression and miRNA scores of miR-15b, respectively. A significant difference was found (<i>p</i> = 0.0011).