Expression of microRNAs and its relationship with cardiac remodeling in hypertensive patients

Abstract

Hypertension is recognized worldwide as a public health problem, because of its high prevalence and incidence in the population. In addition, it is the primary risk factor for the development of other cardiovascular diseases, and may promote target organ damage, in particular left ventricular hypertrophy. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are a group of small molecules (22 nucleotides) of non-coding RNA, evolutionarily conserved, which act by binding to complementary sites on target mRNAs to induce cleavage or repression of protein translation. Several studies suggest that aberrant expression of miRNAs may be involved in the development of cardiac hypertrophy, however little is known about the role of miRNA expression in the development of hypertensive cardiomyopathy. Therefore, the study of miRNAs can lead to the discovery of potential biomarkers for target organ damage in hypertensive patients. Preliminary results from our group demonstrated differential expression of at least 10 miRNAs between hypertensive patients with left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) and non-LVH. The present study aims to expand the investigation of serum miRNA expression and to correlate this data with left ventricular mass (LVM) and geometry in hypertensive patients. In addition, we intend to evaluate the role of these miRNAs in cardiac myocyte hypertrophy in vitro. (AU)