Significance of MicroRNA-100 and 196b in Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia Among Egyptian Children

Abstract

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is one of the most common hematologic malignancies observed in childhood. It is characterized by the clonal proliferation of lymphoid progenitor that has arrested its development at any early stage of B- or T-cell differentiation and results in the accumulation of leukemic lymphoblasts in the bone marrow and extramedullary sites (Chai-Adisaksopha et al., 2016). It accounts for approximately 25% of cancers and 80% of all leukemias in children, who are younger than 15 years (Katz et al., 2015). The development and activation of B- and T-cells at the periphery are controlled by complex protein signaling pathways, which are regulated by the microRNAs (miRNAs), which represent an interesting class of small (18-25 nucleotides) noncoding RNAs that act as post- transcriptional regulators of gene expression through binding to the 3ʹ untranslated regions (UTR) of the target mRNAs, and promoting mRNA degradation or translational repression (Lujambio and Lowe, 2012). In malignant lymphopoiesis, there is an aberrant expression of miRNAs that can be used as biomarkers in diagnosis, differential diagnosis, prognosis and therapy of leukemia (Li et al., 2014; Wang et al., 2016). The present study aimed at assessing the diagnostic efficacy of miRNA-100 and 196b as blood markers for pediatric ALL. Also, the role of the expression levels of miRNAs 100 and 196b in distinguishing between the different pediatric ALL immunophenotypes relative to