MICRORNA-21 AS NOVEL BIOMARKER FOR PANCREATIC BETA CELLS STRESS AND/OR DEATH IN PATIENTS WITH DIABETES MELLITUS TYPE 1

The research aimed to detect the roles of vitamin D (VD) and micro-ribonucleic acid (miRNA)-21-5p as potential predictors and diagnostic biomarkers for type 1 diabetes (T1D) and to determine the degree of association and predictability of them on beta (β) cells stress/death. A case-control study included three study groups: a T1D group that comprised 35 newly onset T1D patients, a first degree relatives (FDRs) group that included a total of 35 FDRs of T1D patients, and a healthy control (HC) group that included a total of 20 subjects. All study subjects were evaluated for their serum connecting (C) peptide and VD, as well as the expression folds of serum miRNA-21-5p. The findings revealed significantly lower levels of C. peptide and VD among T1D and FDRs subjects than the HC group, whereas the folds of miRNA-21-5p were significantly higher in T1D subjects than FDRs and HC subjects. Furthermore, the level of C. peptide had a valuable positive association with VD within T1D and FDRs groups, whereas the folds of miRNA-21-5p have a valuable positive association with C. peptide and VD in FDRs and T1D groups, respectively. Vitamin D had exhibited a significantly decreased level among T1D and FDRs, and positively correlated with residual β-cells function, which indicated the possible utility of its low level as a β- cells stress/death predictive and diagnostic biomarker. Micro-RNA-21-5p indicated the possible utility of its high folds expression as β-cells stress/death predictive and diagnostic biomarker and the high level of miRNA-21-5p might play a vital role in T1D prevention.