{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,10]],"date-time":"2026-07-10T17:19:02Z","timestamp":1783703942207,"version":"3.55.0"},"reference-count":44,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"11","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2022,11,19]],"date-time":"2022-11-19T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1668816000000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100001809","name":"National Natural Science Foundation of China","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["31570976"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["31570976"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100001809","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100001809","name":"National Natural Science Foundation of China","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["201604020148"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["201604020148"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100001809","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"name":"Science and Technology Program of Guangzhou","award":["31570976"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["31570976"]}]},{"name":"Science and Technology Program of Guangzhou","award":["201604020148"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["201604020148"]}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Diagnostics"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Objective: Postmenopausal osteoporosis (PMOP), a chronic systemic metabolic disease prevalent in middle-aged and elderly women, heavily relies on bone mineral density (BMD) measurement as the diagnostic indicator. In this study, we investigated serum microRNAs (miRNAs) as a possible screening tool for PMOP. Methods: This investigation recruited 83 eligible participants from 795 community-dwelling postmenopausal women between June 2020 and August 2021. The miRNA expression profiles in the serum of PMOP patients were evaluated via miRNA microarray (six PMOP patients and four postmenopausal women without osteoporosis (n-PMOP) as controls). Subsequently, results were verified in independent sample sets (47 PMOP patients and 26 n-PMOP controls) using quantitative real-time PCR. In addition, the target genes and main functions of the differentially expressed miRNAs were explored by bioinformatics analysis. Results: Four highly expressed miRNAs in the serum of patients (hsa-miR-144-5p, hsa-miR-506-3p, hsa-miR-8068, and hsa-miR-6851-3p) showed acceptable disease-independent discrimination performance (area under the curve range: 0.747\u20130.902) in the training set and verification set, outperforming traditional bone turnover markers. Among four key miRNAs, hsa-miR-144-5p is the only one that can simultaneously predict changes in BMD in lumbar spine 1\u20134, total hip, and femoral neck (\u03b2 = \u22120.265, p = 0.022; \u03b2 = \u22120.301, p = 0.005; and \u03b2 = \u22120.324, p = 0.003, respectively). Bioinformatics analysis suggested that the differentially expressed miRNAs were targeted mainly to YY1, VIM, and YWHAE genes, which are extensively involved in bone metabolism processes. Conclusions: Bone-metabolism-related serum miRNAs, such as hsa-miR-144-5p, hsa-miR-506-3p, hsa-miR-8068, and hsa-miR-6851-3p, can be used as novel biomarkers for PMOP diagnosis independent of radiological findings and traditional bone turnover markers. Further study of these miRNAs and their target genes may provide new insights into the epigenetic regulatory mechanisms of the onset and progression of the disease.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/diagnostics12112872","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2022,11,21]],"date-time":"2022-11-21T03:11:21Z","timestamp":1669000281000},"page":"2872","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":19,"title":["Bone-Metabolism-Related Serum microRNAs to Diagnose Osteoporosis in Middle-Aged and Elderly Women"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"12","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-9724-3356","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Sheng-Li","family":"Zhao","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Spine Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China"},{"name":"Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Orthopaedics and Traumatology, Guangzhou 510080, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Zhen-Xing","family":"Wen","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Spine Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China"},{"name":"Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Orthopaedics and Traumatology, Guangzhou 510080, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Xiao-Yi","family":"Mo","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Orthopaedics, Guangzhou First People\u2019s Hospital, Guangzhou 510180, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Xiao-Yan","family":"Zhang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Spine Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China"},{"name":"Department of Nutrition, School of Public Health, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Hao-Nan","family":"Li","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Spine Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China"},{"name":"Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Orthopaedics and Traumatology, Guangzhou 510080, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-3247-8255","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Wing-Hoi","family":"Cheung","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Orthopaedics and Traumatology, Prince of Wales Hospital, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR 999077, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Dan","family":"Fu","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Orthopedics, Kiang Wu Hospital, Macau SAR 999078, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Shi-Hong","family":"Zhang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Laboratry Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-1008-8072","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Yong","family":"Wan","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Spine Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China"},{"name":"Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Orthopaedics and Traumatology, Guangzhou 510080, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Bai-Ling","family":"Chen","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Spine Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, China"},{"name":"Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Orthopaedics and Traumatology, Guangzhou 510080, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2022,11,19]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"254","DOI":"10.1056\/NEJMcp1513724","article-title":"Clinical Practice. 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