Japanese encephalitis (JE) is a
mosquito borne viral disease, caused by Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV)
infection producing severe
neuroinflammation in the central nervous system (CNS) with the associated disruption of the blood brain barrier.
MicroRNAs (
miRNAs) are a family of 21-24 nt small non-coding RNAs that play important post-transcriptional regulatory roles in gene expression and have critical roles in virus pathogenesis. We examined the potential roles of
miRNAs in JEV-infected suckling mice brains and found that JEV
infection changed
miRNA expression profiles when the suckling mice began showing nervous symptoms. A total of 1062 known and 71 novel
miRNAs were detected in JEV-infected group, accompanied with 1088 known and 75 novel
miRNAs in mock controls. Among these
miRNAs, one novel and 25 known
miRNAs were significantly differentially expressed, including 18 up-regulated and 8 down-regulated
miRNAs which were further confirmed by real-time PCR. Gene ontology (GO) and signaling pathway analysis of the predicted target mRNAs of the modulated
miRNAs showed that they are correlated with the regulation of apoptosis, neuron differentiation,
antiviral immunity and infiltration of mouse brain, and the validated targets of 12 differentially expressed
miRNAs were enriched for the regulation of cell programmed death, proliferation, transcription, muscle organ development, erythrocyte differentiation, gene expression, plasma membrane and protein domain specific binding. KEGG analysis further reveals that the validated target genes were involved in the Pathways in
cancer,
Neurotrophin signaling pathway,
Toll like receptor signaling pathway,
Endometrial cancer and Jak-STAT signaling pathway. We constructed the interaction networks of
miRNAs and their target genes according to GO terms and KEGG pathways and the expression levels of several target genes were examined. Our data provides a valuable basis for further studies on the regulatory roles of
miRNAs in JE pathogenesis.