The assessment of miR-150 and miR-155 on chronic myelogenous leukemia patients

Micro RNAs are a class of small non-coding RNAs which have been recently shown to play a crucial role in major cellular processes such as development and differentiation through post-transcriptional regulation. The correlation of microRNA expression levels with the pathogenesis of some hematologic malignancies including acute myeloid leukemia is already known. The aim of this study was to investigate the expression of mir-150 and mir-155 in chronic myelogenous leukemia patients. miRNA expression level changes can be used for diagnosis, treatment and estimation of Minimal Residual Disease (MRD). In this descriptive study, the expression of miR-150 and miR-155 in 25 newly diagnosed CML patients in chronic phase and 25 healthy subjects as the control all in Payvand Medical Laboratory were examined by Stem-loop RT-PCR and Real Time PCR techniques. For data analysis, Pearson correlation analysis was used. miR-150 and miR-155 were down-regulated in CML patients rather than in healthy subjects (0.512 and 0.2552, respectively). There was no correlation between the laboratory findings and the miR expression level. But miR-155 was inversely associated with age (p ≤ 0.01). In conclusion, the decreasing expression of miR-150 and miR-155 in chronic myelogenous leukemia is indicative of their induced expression in suppressing proliferation of cells in this disease. Other studies are also required to elucidate the exact role of microRNA by identifying their target genes.