Differential expression of microRNAs in human postmortem brain tissues of MDMA addiction

In this study, we performed miRNA profiling of nucleus accumbens (NAc) and ventral tegmental area (VTA) in MDMA users and control postmortem human brains, which were obtained from Council of Forensic Medicine (Istanbul). According to the microarray analysis of significantly differentially expressed miR-1202 and miR-7975 were selected for further validation using quantitative reverse-transcription PCR (qRT-PCR). qRT-PCR analysis demonstrated that the expression level of miR-7975 was significantly lower in 30 VTA region of MDMA samples compared to 30 control samples. Another significantly deregulated miR-1202 was down-regulated in 30 NAc region of MDMA samples in comparison to 30 control samples. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study demonstrating that changes in miRNA expression levels are associated with postmortem MDMA users’ brains. Alteration of these miRNAs can serve as novel biomarkers for prediction of MDMA addiction. Our findings suggest that certain differentially expressed miRNAs in MDMA seeking behavior can be used as diagnostics and therapeutic markers. In this study, we performed miRNA profiling of nucleus accumbens (NAc) and ventral tegmental area (VTA) in MDMA users and control postmortem human brains, which were obtained from Council of Forensic Medicine (Istanbul). Multiple group comparison