Identification of the would-be apoptosis- and/or expansion-regulating miRNAs. (A) A diagram showing the procedures for identification of the would-be apoptosis and/or expansion (A/E) miRNAs (see Results section for detailed explanations). (B) and (B’) A protein–protein interaction network constructed with STRING (https://string-db.org/) using proteins encoded by the 1597 candidate genes; while B shows an overall view, B’ shows a partial enlarged view of the network containing the 159 proteins with a degree of ≥20 (in yellow). (C) The 16 A/E miRNAs selected from the 39 candidate miRNAs according to their FC. FC, fold change; KEGG, Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes; PPI, protein–protein interaction.