Cancer Management and Research (Apr 2022)
1H-NMR Based Metabolomics Technology Identifies Potential Serum Biomarkers of Colorectal Cancer Lung Metastasis in a Mouse Model
Abstract
Junfei Zhang,1,* Yuanxin Du,2,3,* Yongcai Zhang,4 Yanan Xu,5 Yanying Fan,2,3 Yan Li2,3 1Shanxi Provincial People’s Hospital Affiliated to Shanxi Medical University, Taiyuan, 030001, People’s Republic of China; 2Department of Pharmacology, Basic Medical Sciences Center, Shanxi Medical University, Taiyuan, 030001, People’s Republic of China; 3Key Laboratory of Cellular Physiology, Ministry of Education, Shanxi Medical University, Taiyuan, 030001, People’s Republic of China; 4First Hospital of Shanxi Medical University, Taiyuan, 030001, People’s Republic of China; 5Medical Imaging Department of Shanxi Medical University, Taiyuan, 030001, People’s Republic of China*These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence: Yan Li; Yanying Fan, Department of Pharmacology, Basic Medical Sciences Center, Key Laboratory of Cellular Physiology, Ministry of Education, Shanxi Medical University, 56#, Xin Jian South Road, Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, 030001, People’s Republic of China, Email [email protected]; [email protected]: Lung metastasis is a common metastasis site of colorectal cancer which largely reduces the quality of life and survival rates of patients. The discovery of potential novel diagnostic biomarkers is very meaningful for the early diagnosis of colorectal cancer with lung metastasis.Methods: In the present study, the metabonomic profiling of serum samples of lung metastasis mice was analyzed by 1H-nuclear magnetic resonance (1H-NMR). Principal component analysis (PCA), partial least squares discriminant analysis (PLS-DA), and orthogonal partial least squares discriminant analysis (OPLS-DA) were used to elucidate the distinguishing metabolites between different groups, and all achieved excellent separations, which indicated that metastatic mice could be differentiated from control mice based on the metabolic profiles at serum levels. Furthermore, during lung metastasis of colorectal cancer, metabolic phenotypes changed significantly, and some of metabolites were identified.Results: Among these metabolites, approximately 15 were closely associated with the lung metastasis process. Pathway enrichment analysis results showed deregulation of metabolic pathways participating in the process of lung metastasis, such as synthesis and degradation of ketone bodies pathway, amino acid metabolism pathway and pyruvate metabolism pathway.Conclusion: The present study demonstrated the metabolic disturbances of serum samples of mice during the lung metastasis process of colorectal cancer and provides potential diagnostic biomarkers for the disease.Keywords: colorectal cancer, metastasis, metabolomics, biomarkers, 1H-NMR
