RÉSUMÉ
Objective:To detect the expression of has_circ_0001459 in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) of Epstein-Barr virus (EBV)-infected individuals and evaluate its diagnostic value for EBV infection.Methods:The expression profiles of circRNAs in PBMCs of patients with EBV infection were obtained by whole-transcriptome sequencing. Differentially expressed circRNAs with statistical significance were selected based on the criteria of ∣log 2Fold Change∣≥1 and P<0.05. Based on the composition, length and primer specificity, hsa_circ_0001459 with high expression was selected for further research. The relative expression of hsa_circ_0001459 in PBMCs of 60 patients with EBV infection and 45 healthy people was detected by real-time fluorescent quantitative PCR. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve and Kappa analysis were used to analyze the diagnostic value of hsa_circ_0001459 expression for EBV infection. Results:The expression of hsa_circ_0001459 showed an up-regulation trend in patients with EBV infection as compared with that in the healthy people, and the results were consistent with the sequencing results. The area under the ROC curve for screening EBV-infected individuals was 0.83(95%CI: 0.75-0.91) with the sensitivity of 0.80(95%CI: 0.66-0.89) and the specificity of 0.77(95%CI: 0.65-0.86). Kappa analysis indicated that hsa_circ_0001459 was moderately consistent with EBV DNA in the diagnosis of EBV infection (κ=0.51).Conclusions:Hsa_circ_0001459 tended to be highly expressed in PBMCs of EBV-infected individuals, which might be uses as a diagnostic marker for EBV infection.