Figure 1
Comparison of transcript levels of miRNA targets between in prostate cancer and in benign tissues. (A) The transcript levels of miRNA targets in prostate tumours were compared with those of total mRNAs using Rmir, Rtotal and RR values (see methods). The R values of all miRNA targets (Rmir) and total altered mRNAs (Rtotal) are represented as black and white bars, respectively. Also plotted are the RR (Rmir/Rtotal) values (colored dots, right axis). The RR value is a surrogate for an increased or decreased abundance of miRNA targets relative to total mRNAs. Blue color denotes RR < 1 and red denotes RR > 1. Three gene expression microarray datasets (Dataset 1, 2 and 3) were used for this comparison. Three different cut-off values (L: Low; M: Medium; and H: High) and two methods a and b (for dataset 1 and 2) were chosen to rule out the bias of single method. Asterisk represents the statistical significance of each comparison (resampling statistical test, see methods). One asterisk means P < 0.05; two asterisks, P < 0.01; three asterisks, P < 0.0002. The complete data are reported [see Additional file 1]. (B) Analysis of the protein levels of miRNA targets using a small proteomic dataset. Black and green cycles represent the numbers of increased and decreased proteins in prostate tumours relative to benign prostate tissues, respectively. Small cycles represent the number of miRNA targets mapped into these two protein groups. Areas of the cycles are scaled to the proteins number. (C) Correlation between the RR values obtained using two different miRNA target predictions.