Altered non-coding RNA profiles and potential disease marker identification in peripheral blood mononuclear cells of patients with NMOSD

Neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder (NMOSD) is an inflammatory demyelination disorder, and dysregulation of RNAs contributes to its pathogenesis. We aimed to reveal the expression profiles of RNAs, including messenger RNA (mRNA), circular RNA (circRNA) and long non-coding RNA (lncRNA), in the peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) of patients with NMOSD. Seven NMOSD patients and seven healthy controls (HCs) were enrolled in the competitive endogenous RNA (ceRNA) microarray analysis. Bioinformatics analysis was then performed on the microarray data. Selected RNAs were validated by RT-qPCR. Differentially expressed (DE) RNA profiles of patients and HCs were related to NK cell mediated cytotoxicity, the IL-17 signaling pathway, and the B cell receptor signaling pathway. Moreover, DE non-coding RNAs (DE ncRNAs) including DE circRNAs and DE lncRNAs, may participate in the transforming growth factor beta (TGF-β) signaling pathway, leukocyte migration and neutrophil chemotaxis. Immune cell infiltration analysis showed that the abundance of M1 macrophages and plasma cells significantly increased, while that of M2 macrophages significantly decreased in the NMOSD group. Finally, through RT-qPCR validation, lnc-HELZ-7:1 (95% confidential interval of area under curve [95%CI of AUC] = 0.6633-1.0000), ring finger protein-LIM domain interacting (RLIM; 95%CI of AUC = 0.6980-1.0000), and hsa_circ_0026993 (95%CI of AUC = 0.7550-1.0000) could discriminate NMOSD from HCs by receiver operating characteristic curve analysis. To our knowledge, this is the first study to preliminarily investigate the RNA profiles, especially circRNA profiles in PBMCs of NMOSD patients from North China. We identified lnc-HELZ-7:1, RLIM, and hsa_circ_0026993 as the potential disease markers for NMOSD.