Table 1. Synopsis of results of published studies investigating the potential of circulating miRNAs as biomarkers of prostate cancer.

Study design	Upregulated miRNAs	Downregulated miRNAs	Sample type	Method	Patient numbers	Reference
Cancer vs benign	100, 125b, 141, 143, 296		Serum	qRT-PCR	25 metastatic PCa vs 25 controls	Mitchell et al, 2008
	16, 92a, 103, 107, 197, 34b, 328, 485-3p, 486-5p, 92b, 574-3p, 636, 640, 766, 885-5p		Serum	MiR microarray	5 PCa vs 8 controls (other cancers tested)	Lodes et al, 2009
	221		Plasma	qRT-PCR	28 PCa vs 20 controls	Zheng et al, 2011
	141, 298, 346, 375		Serum	qRT-PCR	25 metastatic PCa vs 25 controls	Selth et al, 2012
	346, 622, 940, 1285	let-7e, let-7c	Plasma	Illumina miR microarray	25 PCa vs 17 BPH, then validation in 80 PCa, 44 BPH and 54 HI	Chen et al, 2012
	375, 141	181a-2	Plasma	qRT-PCR	78 PCa vs 28 controls, then 16 metastatic vs 55 non-metastatic	Bryant et al, 2012
Localised cancer vs metastatic cancer	9*, 141, 200b, 375, 516a		Serum	qRT-PCR	7 metastatic PCa vs 14 localised PCa	Brase et al, 2011
	21		Serum	qRT-PCR	50 PCa (20 localised, 20 ADPC, 10 HRPC) vs 6 BPH	Zhang et al, 2011
	375, 141	181a-2	Plasma	qRT-PCR	78 PCa vs 28 controls, then 16 metastatic vs 55 non-metastatic	Bryant et al, 2012
Cancer at different stage/risks vs benign	21, 221		Plasma	qRT-PCR	51 PCa (18 localised, 8 locally advanced, 25 metastatic) vs 20 HI	Yaman Agaoglu et al, 2011
	93, 106a, 874, 1207	24, 26b, 30c, 223	Serum	Multiplexed qRT-PCR	36 PCa (12 low risk, 12 medium risk, 12 high risk) vs 12 controls	Moltzahn et al, 2011
	26a, 195, Let7i, 16		Serum	qRT-PCR	45 (37 localised, 8 metastatic) PCa vs 38 controls (18 BPH, 20 HI)	Mahn et al, 2011
	20a, 21		Plasma	qRT-PCR	82 PCa assessing association with CAPRA score	Shen et al, 2012

Abbreviations: ADPC=androgen-dependent prostate cancer; HRPC=hormone refractory prostate cancer; BPH=benign prostatic hypertrophy; HI= healthy individuals; PCa=prostate cancer; qRT-PCR=quantitative real-time PCR; miR=microRNA; CAPRA=Cancer of the Prostate Risk Assessment. *Where one hairpin miR precursor gives rise to two mature miRs, one from each arm, an asterisk is used to denote the least predominant form.