Our results indicate that there is a clear difference in the miRNA molecular phenotypic profile of gluteal and abdominal adipose tissue and that miRNA expression is at least partly driven by effects related to common genetic variation. Our results also suggest an association between miRNA and mRNA expression levels, indicating that miRNAs may play an active role in gene regulation in adipose tissue. The exact mechanisms through which miRNAs act are still elusive and future work would need to include detailed functional studies (for the miRNAs where this is not already available), as well as proteomic studies, to find evidence of the implications of miRNA expression changes on the related protein abundances in adipose tissue.
