Fig. 2

Circulating miR-122 levels in acute phase, NPR hepatitis E patients. (a) Decreased serum levels of miR-122, in NPR-HEV patients. Scatter plots of serum miR-122 levels in healthy NPR controls (NPR-C, n = 25), NPR HEV infected patients in early (NPR-HEV-acute, n = 27) and convalescent stages (NPR-HEV-conv, n = 12) respectively. NPR-HEV group was subdivided into early and late stage. The line indicates the median value per group. Circulating miR-122 levels are expressed as log10 of miR-122 copies ml-1 serum. The Mann-Whitney U test was used to determine the statistical significance. p < 0.05 was considered to be significant. (b) ROC analysis using serum miR-122 for discriminating NPR-HEV patients. ROC curve with corresponding area under curve (AUC) for miR-122 in discriminating NPR-HEV-acute patients from NPR healthy controls. p < 0.05 was considered to be significant. (c) Correlation of serum miR-122 and ALT levels in NPR-HEV patients. The correlation of serum miR-122 levels with serum ALT levels among acute phase, NPR-HEV patients was determined by Spearman rank correlation coefficient. r indicates the correlation coefficient and p < 0.05 was considered significant