2.7. Gene Expression Analyses
For a quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR), miRNAs were transcribed into cDNAs using the TaqMan™ Advanced miRNA cDNA Synthesis Kit (Applied Biosystems, Waltham, MA, USA) using a poly-(A) tail and universal random primers. To provide detection and quantification of miRNAs for follow-up experiments, miRNA arrays were performed. For this purpose, the TaqMan