Ess the influence of genomic DNA, we used heatlysed cells as a template for the RT reaction. The cell pellets were re-suspended in 100 mL 16 PBS, heated at 95uC for 5 min, and immediately chilled on ice before being added directly into the RT reaction. Yeast tRNA was employed as an RNA carrier to MedChemExpress 58-49-1 provide a complex RNA background in RT reactions. It was purchased from Invitrogen (catalogue no.15401011). The integrity and purity of the RNA was measured based on electrophoresis traces and A260/A280 value, respectively. RNA extraction was performed by two different operators simultaneously.Figure 6. miRNA Expression Profile of Four miRNAs in Mouse Tissues. The miRNA expression values were normalized to the snRNA U6 expression data and are calculated with 22DDCq relative quantification. miR-122 and miR-133a are highly tissue specifically expressed in liver and heart, respectively. let-7a acted as a housekeeping microRNA. Each column represents the mean (6 SD) of three measurements. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0046890.gprompted us to investigate amplification efficiency of the new assay. Comparison result as shown in Table 1 demonstrated higher-level efficiency of the present approach than the Exiqon miRCURY method. This finding suggests that the new assay could exert comparable specificity to LNA-spiked primers, but would not have a negative impact on amplification efficiency. In this new assay, we used poly(U) instead of the traditional poly(A) as it can prevent the oligo(A) RT primer from binding the poly(A) tail of the mRNA. The RT reaction can achieve reverse transcription of miRNAs, mRNA and the 3687-18-1 web internal control (U6) from the same sample in the same system, which has the advantage of keeping the identical 
reaction efficiency. It has been shown that polyuridylation of pre-miRNA might be inefficient due to the presence of the stem-loop structure [25,26]. Thus, the negligible level and low polyuridylation efficiency of pre-miRNAs are unlikely to affect the quantification of the miRNA. Stem-loop/ poly(A) RT primers (SL-poly(A)) can potentially be used for multiplex RT reactions of mRNA and miRNAs in the same run.PolyuridylationFollowing the manufacturer’s instructions (New England Biolabs, catalogue no. M0337S), 10 ng of total RNA, certain amounts of the corresponding synthetic miRNA with 50 ng yeast tRNA, or heat-lysed cells was polyuridylated with UTP by poly(U) polymerase at 37uC for 1 h in a 20 mL reaction volume. After extraction with phenol/chloroform and precipitation in ethanol, the treated RNA was dissolved in diethylpyrocarbonate (DEPC)treated water.ConclusionsThe spatiotemporal expression patterns of miRNAs are important for the verification of their predicted function. There is an urgent need for a highly specific and simple method for quantification of miRNA. The proposed approach offers an alternative method for scientists to quantify multiple miRNA expression of the same sample. We are currently improving the approach, which is expected to increase the utility of this method.Reverse TranscriptionReverse transcription was performed using the M-MLV RT kit (Invitrogen catalogue no. 28025013) according to the manufacturer’s instructions. The RT reaction was performed using treated total RNA and the RT primer SL-poly(A). The 12 mL RT reaction mixture contained 10 ng of treated RNA (or certain amounts of the corresponding treated synthetic miRNA), 0.5 mL of RT primer SL-poly(A) (5 mM) and 0.5 mL of 10 mM dNTP Mix (10 mM each). The mix.Ess the influence of genomic DNA, we used heatlysed cells as a template for the RT reaction. The cell pellets were re-suspended in 100 mL 16 PBS, heated at 95uC for 5 min, and immediately chilled on ice before being added directly into the RT reaction. Yeast tRNA was employed as an RNA carrier to provide a complex RNA background in RT reactions. It was purchased from Invitrogen (catalogue no.15401011). The integrity and purity of the RNA was measured based on electrophoresis traces and A260/A280 value, respectively. RNA extraction was performed by two different operators simultaneously.Figure 6. miRNA Expression Profile of Four miRNAs in Mouse Tissues. The miRNA expression values were normalized to the snRNA U6 expression data and are calculated with 22DDCq relative quantification. miR-122 and miR-133a are highly tissue specifically expressed in liver and heart, respectively. let-7a acted as a housekeeping microRNA. Each column represents the mean (6 SD) of three measurements. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0046890.gprompted us to investigate amplification efficiency of the new assay. Comparison result as shown in Table 1 demonstrated higher-level efficiency of the present approach than the Exiqon miRCURY method. This finding suggests that the new assay could exert comparable specificity to LNA-spiked primers, but would not have a negative impact on amplification efficiency. In this new assay, we used poly(U) instead of the traditional poly(A) as it can prevent the oligo(A) RT primer from binding the poly(A) tail of the mRNA. The RT reaction can achieve reverse transcription of miRNAs, mRNA and the internal control (U6) from the same sample in the same system, which has the advantage of keeping the identical reaction efficiency. It has 
been shown that polyuridylation of pre-miRNA might be inefficient due to the presence of the stem-loop structure [25,26]. Thus, the negligible level and low polyuridylation efficiency of pre-miRNAs are unlikely to affect the quantification of the miRNA. Stem-loop/ poly(A) RT primers (SL-poly(A)) can potentially be used for multiplex RT reactions of mRNA and miRNAs in the same run.PolyuridylationFollowing the manufacturer’s instructions (New England Biolabs, catalogue no. M0337S), 10 ng of total RNA, certain amounts of the corresponding synthetic miRNA with 50 ng yeast tRNA, or heat-lysed cells was polyuridylated with UTP by poly(U) polymerase at 37uC for 1 h in a 20 mL reaction volume. After extraction with phenol/chloroform and precipitation in ethanol, the treated RNA was dissolved in diethylpyrocarbonate (DEPC)treated water.ConclusionsThe spatiotemporal expression patterns of miRNAs are important for the verification of their predicted function. There is an urgent need for a highly specific and simple method for quantification of miRNA. The proposed approach offers an alternative method for scientists to quantify multiple miRNA expression of the same sample. We are currently improving the approach, which is expected to increase the utility of this method.Reverse TranscriptionReverse transcription was performed using the M-MLV RT kit (Invitrogen catalogue no. 28025013) according to the manufacturer’s instructions. The RT reaction was performed using treated total RNA and the RT primer SL-poly(A). The 12 mL RT reaction mixture contained 10 ng of treated RNA (or certain amounts of the corresponding treated synthetic miRNA), 0.5 mL of RT primer SL-poly(A) (5 mM) and 0.5 mL of 10 mM dNTP Mix (10 mM each). The mix.
