Differential Circular RNA Expression Analysis for Screening the Potential Biomarkers in Atrial Fibrillation Patients

Abstract Background: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common arrhythmia worldwide. Accumulating evidence indicated circular RNA (circRNA) as an epigenetic regulator play a critical role in the development of various of cardiovascular diseases. However, the regulatory network of circRNA/miRNA/mRNA involved in AF was still little investigated.Methods: In the present study, AF-related differentially expressed circRNAs (DE circRNAs) were derived from the Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) datasets GSE97455 by bioinformatic analysis. Then, miRNAs targeted by these circRNAs were predicted using the Circular RNA Interactome. These putative miRNAs were next used to predict mRNAs using three databases including miRDB, miRTarBase, and TargetScan. The targeted mRNAs were the intersection of the above-mentioned predicted mRNAs overlapping with differentially expressed genes (DEGs) identified from GEO datasets GSE79768.Results: We firstly screened 46 DE circRNAs, 90 putative miRNAs, and 32 overlapping genes in the network of circRNA/miRNA/mRNA constructed by Cytoscape. Further, the top 7 DE circRNAs (hsa_circ_0000367, hsa_circ_0000691, hsa_circ_0000288, hsa_circ_0006168, hsa_circ_0001666, hsa_circ_0021652, and hsa_circ_0030162) were screened in the constructed circRNA/miRNA/mRNA regulatory network consisting of 7 circRNAs, 42 miRNAs, and 25 mRNAs, including 53 circRNA–miRNA pairs and 64 miRNA–mRNA pairs, which were closely related to AF.Conclusion: Our findings revealed that 7 DE circRNAs were involved in a circRNA/miRNA/mRNA regulatory network in AF and may be potential novel biomarkers in AF.