The Role of MicroRNA in the Development of Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus

The review presents an analysis of literary data on the role of microRNAs in the pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes mellitus and use in diagnostics as potential biomarkers and existing modern molecular genetic methods for the detection of microRNAs. The main functions of microRNAs in glucose metabolism are regulation of key enzymes of glucose catabolism, inhibition of activators/repressors of insulin transcription and genes that should not be expressed in β-cells, reduction of fusion and release of insulin granules, and influence on enzymatic reactions in peripheral tissues. The methods for determining microRNA expression levels were analyzed: Northern blotting, microarrays, NGS sequencing, RT-PCR, and ligation-mediated PCR. The results of the review will be useful for the development of microRNA-based diagnostic strategies for type 2 diabetes mellitus.