title: Clinical significance of circulating miR-126 quantification in malignant mesothelioma patients.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Aim of this study was to evaluate the accuracy and precision of the detection of individual miRNA as clinical biomarkers in the serum.
  
  
  METHODS
  miRNA-126 was quantified in serum using endogenous and exogenous controls for normalization and the accuracy and precision of the method evaluated. The diagnostic value of serum miRNA-126 was evaluated in malignant mesothelioma (MM) and non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients using both relative and absolute qRT-PCR methods.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The use of endogenous invariant and exogenous synthetic controls as well sample dilution markedly improves the accuracy and precision of the assay. The inter- and intra-assay analyses revealed that relative qRT-PCR is a more reliable method. Circulating miR-126 detected in the serum by relative qRT-PCRs was found low-expressed in both malignancies, significantly differentiated MM patients from healthy controls and NSCLC from MM, but do not discriminate NSCLC patients from control subjects. Kaplan-Meier analysis revealed that low level of circulating miR-126 in MM patients was strongly associated with worse prognosis.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  We propose that this approach can be adopted for accurate analysis of other suitable circulating miRNA markers of different types of cancer.
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular and Clinical Sciences, Polytechnic University of Marche, 60126 Ancona, Italy. m.tomasetti@univpm.it
authors.forename: Marco
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Tomasetti
authors.forename: Sara
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Staffolani
authors.forename: Linda
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Nocchi
authors.forename: Jiri
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Neuzil
authors.forename: Elisabetta
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Strafella
authors.forename: Nicola
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Manzella
authors.forename: Laura
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Mariotti
authors.forename: Massimo
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bracci
authors.forename: Matteo
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Valentino
authors.forename: Monica
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Amati
authors.forename: Lory
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Santarelli
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor / Q000097:blood / Q000235:genetics; D002289:Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung / Q000097:blood / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000235:genetics; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D053208:Kaplan-Meier Estimate; D008297:Male; D008654:Mesothelioma / Q000097:blood / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000235:genetics; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000032:analysis / Q000097:blood*; D008875:Middle Aged; D011379:Prognosis; D012015:Reference Standards; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction / Q000379:methods; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity
chemical_list: D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor; C527111:MIRN126 microRNA, human; D035683:MicroRNAs