Micro RNAs as mediators of cardiovascular disease: Targets to be manipulated

Cardiovascular disease has been the leading cause of death worldwide for the last few decades. Even with therapid progression of the biomedical field, conquering/managing cardiovascular disease is not an easy task because it is multifactorial disease. One of the key players of the development and progression of numerous diseases is micro RNA(mi RNA). These small, non-coding RNAs bind to target m RNAs to inhibit translations of and/or degrade the target m RNAs, thus acting as negative regulators of gene expressions. Accumulating evidence indicates that non-physiological expressions of mi RNAs contribute to both development and progression of cardiovascular diseases. Since even a single mi RNA can have multiple targets, dysregulation of mi RNAs can lead to catastrophic changes of proteins that may be important for maintaining physiologic conditions of cells, tissues, and organs. Current knowledge on the role of mi RNAs in cardiovascular disease is mostly based on the observational data such as microarray of mi RNAs in animal disease models, thus relatively lacking insight of how such dysregulation of mi RNAs is initiated and regulated. Consequently, future research should aim to elucidate the more comprehensive mechanisms of mi RNA dysregulation during pathogenesis of the cardiovascular system so that appropriate countermeasures to prevent/manage cardiovascular disease can be developed.