Gene Expression Profiles of Papillary Thyroid Microcarcinoma

The objective was to identify gene expression profile of papillary thyroid microcarcinoma. To help improve diagnosis of papillary thyroid microcarcinoma, we performed gene expression profiling and compared it to pair normal thyroid tissues. We performed microarray analysis with 6 papillary thyroid microcarcinoma and 6 pair normal thyroid tissues. Differentially expressed genes were selected using paired t test, linear models for microarray data, and significance analysis of microarrays. Real-time quantitative reverse transcription–polymerase chain reaction was used to validate the representative 10 genes (MET, TIMP1, QPCT, PROS1, LRP4, SDC4, CITED1, DPP4, LRRK2, RUNX2). We identified 91 differentially expressed genes (84 upregulated and 7 downregulated) in the gene expression profile and validated 10 genes of the profile. We identified a significant genetic difference between papillary thyroid microcarcinoma and normal tissue by 10 upregulated genes greater than 2-fold (P < 0.05).