Fig. 1.

A panel of six serum-derived circular RNAs and their potential diagnostic value in CRC. A. Expression levels of circRNAs, including circ_0060745, circ_001569, circ_007142, circ_0084043, Circ_BANP, and CiRS-7, in CRC and healthy control serum samples. B. The area under the ROC curve (AUC) with 95 % of confidence intervals (CIs) was determined to test the diagnostic accuracy of each circular RNA. All circRNAs exhibited satisfactory AUC values, with circ_0060745 at 0.85, circ_001569 at 0.91, circ_007142 at 0.92, circ_0084043 at 0.93, Circ_BANP at 0.81, and CiRS-7 at 0.79. In all cases, p-values were less than 0.001. C. Expression levels of serum-derived circRNAs in CRC patients with positive and negative lymph node metastasis (LNM). All circRNAs (except for CiRS-7) exhibited elevated expression levels in CRC patients with positive LNM. D. Expression levels of serum-derived circRNAs associated with TNM stages. All circRNAs (except for CiRS-7) showed high expression levels in advanced stages of tumorigenesis in CRC patients. The columns represent the means of three independent experiments, with the bars indicating the standard deviation (SD). ns: not significant, *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01. HC: Healthy control, CRC: Colorectal cancer patients, ROC: Receiver operating characteristic, AUC: Area Under the Curve, Early stages: TNM stages I and II, Advanced stages: TNM stage III.