The role of microRNAs in pathogenesis of placental insufficiency - related pregnancies

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small noncoding RNAs of length ranging from 18 to 25 nucleotides that regulate gene expression at posttranscriptional level. Expression of some miRNAs is tissue specific. This task assumed that placental insufficiency related pregnancy complications may be characterised by the dysregulation of microRNAs that are crutial for the regulation of cardiovascular system and cardiovascular diseases. The gene expresion of 32 cardiovascular miRNAs was studied in two types of biological material - placental tissue and maternal whole peripheral blood. Patient cohort of clinically manifested preeclampsia (PE), gestational hypertension (GH) and intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR) was compared with samples derived from normal pregnancies (FG). In total, 127 placental tissue samples (20 FG, GH 20, 20 IUGR , 67 PE) and 80 maternal whole peripheral blood samples (20 FG, GH 20, 20 IUGR , 20 PE) were processed. Before the research, two pilot studies focused on the selection of endogenous controls for data normalization of gene expression in both types of biological material were performed. Detection and quantification was carried out by quantitative real-time PCR. In a group of placental tissue several miRNAs showed elevated levels in GH (miR-1, miR-16, miR-17, miR-20a, miR-21, miR-23a,..