Expression profile of circRNA in peripheral blood mononuclear cells of patients with rheumatoid arthritis

Fig. 1. CircRNA expression profile in RA patients, and healthy controls. CircRNA expression was determined by microarray analysis in four RA patients, and four healthy controls. a CircRNA Box-Plot. After normalization, the CircRNA data distribution in 8 samples is uniform, and the symmetry is good, and the position of the overall data is approximately on the same horizontal line, and the fluorescent signal strength is approximately consistent, and the next treatment can be performed. b CircRNA Scatter-Plot. Parts above the first green line and below the third green line represent circRNA with difference multiple greater than 1.5, and parts between them represent circular RNA with no difference in expression

Fig. 2. Hierarchical cluster analysis of circRNA. Different expressions of circRNA in different samples can be visually displayed. Each column represents a test sample and each row represents a circRNA. The color shade represented the expression level of circRNA. Red indicated high expression, green indicated low expression, and black indicated no expression. The results show that the difference spectrum is reliable

Fig. 3. Characteristics of differentially expressed circRNA. a Chromosome localization of differentially expressed circRNA. Abbreviation: chr Chromosome. b Source region of differentially expressed circRNA

Fig. 4. Reverse transcription‑quantitative PCR results of the relative expression levels of circRNAs in PBMCs from patients with RA and the comparison group. a-c Hsa_circRNA_009012, hsa_circRNA_050898 and hsa_circRNA_101328 in RA patients were selected for validation. Expression levels of three circRNAs were validated by RT-qPCR in the PBMCs from 4 RA patients, and 4 healthy controls. d The expression levels of hsa_circRNA_101328 in PBMCs of 20 RA patients, 10 SLE patients and 20 HC were determined by RT-qPCR. Test: RA patients; Control: healthy controls; SLE: systemic lupus erythematosus patients

Fig. 5. ROC analysis of hsa_circRNA_101328 in PBMCs of RA patients. AUC values are given on the graphs. Test: RA patients; Control: healthy controls

Fig. 6. GO and KEGG pathway analyses of hsa_circRNA_101328. a–c Gene Ontology (GO) analysis for hsa_circRNA_101328-interacting miRNAs and their target genes showing significantly enriched pathways. A indicates biological process (BP), B indicates molecular function (MF), and C indicates cellular component (CC). d KEGG Pathway analysis for hsa_circRNA_101328-interacting miRNAs and their target genes. GO: Gene Ontology; KEGG: Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes; Sig pathway: significant pathway