Prostate Cancer Associated Lipid Signatures in Serum Studied by ESI-Tandem Mass Spectrometryas Potential New Biomarkers

PLoS One. 2016 Mar 9;11(3):e0150253. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0150253. eCollection 2016.

Abstract

Prostate cancer (PCa) is one amongst the most common cancersin western men. Incidence rate ofPCa is on the rise worldwide. The present study deals with theserum lipidome profiling of patients diagnosed with PCa to identify potential new biomarkers. We employed ESI-MS/MS and GC-MS for identification of significantly altered lipids in cancer patient's serum compared to controls. Lipidomic data revealed 24 lipids are significantly altered in cancer patinet's serum (n = 18) compared to normal (n = 18) with no history of PCa. By using hierarchical clustering and principal component analysis (PCA) we could clearly separate cancer patients from control group. Correlation and partition analysis along with Formal Concept Analysis (FCA) have identified that PC (39:6) and FA (22:3) could classify samples with higher certainty. Both the lipids, PC (39:6) and FA (22:3) could influence the cataloging of patients with 100% sensitivity (all 18 control samples are classified correctly) and 77.7% specificity (of 18 tumor samples 4 samples are misclassified) with p-value of 1.612×10-6 in Fischer's exact test. Further, we performed GC-MS to denote fatty acids altered in PCa patients and found that alpha-linolenic acid (ALA) levels are altered in PCa. We also performed an in vitro proliferation assay to determine the effect of ALA in survival of classical human PCa cell lines LNCaP and PC3. We hereby report that the altered lipids PC (39:6) and FA (22:3) offer a new set of biomarkers in addition to the existing diagnostic tests that could significantly improve sensitivity and specificity in PCa diagnosis.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Aged
  • Biomarkers, Tumor / blood*
  • Cell Line, Tumor
  • Cell Proliferation / drug effects
  • Chromatography, Gas
  • Cluster Analysis
  • Humans
  • Lipids / blood*
  • Male
  • Middle Aged
  • Principal Component Analysis
  • Prostatic Neoplasms / blood*
  • Spectrometry, Mass, Electrospray Ionization*
  • Tandem Mass Spectrometry*
  • alpha-Linolenic Acid / pharmacology

Substances

  • Biomarkers, Tumor
  • Lipids
  • alpha-Linolenic Acid

Grants and funding

The project is supported by Department of Biotechnology (DBT), Ministry of Science of Technology, India. Grant No: 6242-P- 54/RGCB/PMD/DBT/RHUN/2015. DD Acknowledges Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), India for CSIR-JRF fellowship and AcSIR for registering as graduate student.