Huiqin Wang; Xiaoling Zhang; Juan Bu & Weidong Wu

This study is to investigate the regulation of Notch1 and Foxp1 by miR-34a in the development of psoriasis vulgaris. RT-PCR was used to compare the levels of miR-34a in the skin lesions of 20 patients with psoriasis vulgaris and 20 normal skin tissues. Immunohistochemistry was used to detect the expression of Notch1 and Foxp1 in 51 patients with psoriasis vulgaris, which were further compared with that in 29 normal control tissues. In addition, in HaCaT cells, we used miR-34a mimics and inhibitors to overexpress and inhibit miR-34a, respectively, and detected the mRNA and protein levels of miR-34a, Notch1, and Foxp1. The level of miR-34a in the skin lesions of patients with psoriasis vulgaris was significantly higher than that in normal skin tissues (t=2.192, P<0.05). The positive rate of Notch1 in the skin lesions of patients with psoriasis vulgaris was 76.47 %, which was significantly higher than that in normal skin tissues (13.79 %) (t=29.215, P<0.01). The positive rate of FOXP1 in the psoriasis vulgaris group was 92.16 %, which was also significantly higher than that in the normal skin group (65.52 %) (t=9.087, P<0.01). In addition, overexpression of miR-34a significantly promoted the expression of Notch1 and Foxp1. However, inhibition of miR-34a significantly reduced Notch1 and Foxp1 levels. miR- 34a is highly expressed in the skin tissues of patients with psoriasis vulgaris, and may participate in the development of psoriasis vulgaris by regulating Notch1 and Foxp1.

KEY WORDS: Psoriasis vulgaris; miR-34a; Notch1; Foxp1.

WANG, H.; ZHANG, X.; BU, J. & WU, W. Regulation of Notch1 and Foxp1 by MiR-34a in psoriasis vulgaris. Int. J. Morphol., 40(3):735-741, 2022.