(a).

Gene/rs number	Genotype	Controls number	Stage I					Stage II
			Patients	Odds ratio	0.95 confidence intervals		p ∗	Patients	Odds ratio	0.95 confidence intervals		p ∗
			number		Lower limit	Upper limit		number		Lower limit	Upper limit
DROSHA
6877842	CC	15	1	Ref.				0	Ref.
	CG	79	5	0.9494	0.1034	8.7141	0.6590	3	NA
	GG	76	4	0.7895	0.0824	7.5674	0.6067	5	NA
DICER1
3742330	AA	63	1	Ref.				2	Ref.
	AG	103	8	4.8932	0.5978	40.0546	0.0967	4	1.2233	0.2177	6.8735	0.5907
	GG	4	0	NA				0	NA
13078	AA	10	0	Ref.				1	Ref.
	AT	124	8	NA				6	0.4839	0.0529	4.4237	0.4409
	TT	36	2	NA				1	0.2778	0.0159	4.8457	0.4095
DGCR8
1640299	GG	16	0	Ref.				0	Ref.
	GT	93	2	NA				6	NA
	TT	61	4	NA				2	NA
3757	AA	15	1	Ref.				0	Ref.
	AG	119	7	0.8824	0.1014	7.6744	0.6255	6	NA
	GG	36	1	0.4167	0.0244	7.107	0.5166	2	NA
417309	AA	8	4	Ref.				1	Ref.
	AG	46	2	0.087	0.0136	0.5564	0.0119	4	0.6957	0.0686	7.0533	0.5767
	GG	116	3	0.0517	0.0098	0.2719	0.0012	2	0.1379	0.0113	1.689	0.1993
RAN
14035	CC	67	7	Ref.				2	Ref.
	CT	93	2	0.2058	0.0415	1.0221	0.0383	5	1.8011	0.3392	9.5644	0.3884
	TT	10	1	0.9571	0.1063	8.6223	0.7245	0	NA
TARBP2
7845672	AA	35	1	Ref.				0	Ref.
	AG	114	6	1.8421	0.2144	15.8246	0.4907	3	NA
	GG	21	2	3.3333	0.2846	39.0437	0.3346	5	NA
XPO5
11077	GG	82	2	Ref.				1	Ref.
	GT	44	4	3.7273	0.6565	21.1609	0.1274	4	7.4545	0.8082	68.7565	0.06
	TT	34	3	3.6176	0.5784	22.6277	0.1663	3	7.2353	0.7267	72.0402	0.0865

^∗All p values are for Fisher's exact probability test due to low sample sizes.