Fig. 3.

Expression level of plasma miRNA candidates as biomarkers for acute HIV-1 infection in the validation stage. The level of plasma miRNAs in 60 HIV-1 positive plasma samples in the acute stage infection and 25 healthy controls plasma were examined using real-time RT-PCR and normalized with cel-miR-39 as the control. Comparison of the miRNA expression profiles in plasma samples from HIV-1 infected patients in the acute phase of infection with the uninfected controls indicated that, nine miRNAs were significantly down regulated, and four miRNAs were significantly up regulated when compared to uninfected controls. Each sample was run in triplicate. (*P < 0·05; **P < 0·01, ***P < 0·0001 and ns = non-significant, as calculated using Student's t-test).