A novel tetrapeptide fluorescence sensor for early diagnosis of prostate cancer based on imaging Zn2+ in healthy versus cancerous cells

Yong An; Wei Chang; Wei Wang; Hao Wu; Ke Pu; Anhu Wu; Ze Qin; Yan Tao; Zhongjin Yue; Peng Wang; Zhiping Wang

doi:10.1016/j.jare.2020.04.008

A novel tetrapeptide fluorescence sensor for early diagnosis of prostate cancer based on imaging Zn²⁺ in healthy versus cancerous cells

J Adv Res. 2020 Apr 28:24:363-370. doi: 10.1016/j.jare.2020.04.008. eCollection 2020 Jul.

Authors

Yong An¹, Wei Chang¹, Wei Wang¹, Hao Wu¹, Ke Pu², Anhu Wu¹, Ze Qin¹, Yan Tao¹, Zhongjin Yue¹, Peng Wang³, Zhiping Wang¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Urology, Institute of Urology, Gansu Nephro-Urological Clinical Center, Key Laboratory of Urological Diseases in Gansu Province, The Second Hospital of Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, Gansu 730030, China.
² Department of Gastroenterology, The First Hospital of Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, China.
³ Chemical Synthesis and Pollution Control Key Laboratory of Sichuan Province, College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, China West Normal University, Shida Road 1#, Nanchong 637002, China.

Abstract

Zinc as a biomarker can be used to diagnose the early stage prostate cancer, while ZIP1 protein, a zinc transporter is significantly down-regulated in prostate cancer cells. This behavior leads to the apparent alteration of the enrichment ability for zinc between early prostate cancer tissues and healthy tissues. This difference inspires us to develop a novel Zn²⁺ sensor that applies to the clinic diagnosis of early prostate cancer. We designed a tetrapeptide sensor H₂L (Dansyl-Gly-Pro-Trp-Gly-NH₂) according to the photo-induced electron transfer principle (PET), and it performed adequately in Zn²⁺ imaging of prostate cell lines. Based on the assessment of Zn²⁺ enrichment ability, there was distinctly lower Zn²⁺ concentrate in prostate cancer cell lines than healthy prostate epithelial cells. Furthermore, H₂L displayed high sensitivity with a detection limit as low as 49.5 nM, and high specificity for Zn²⁺ detection. Also the low toxicity and the superior cell permeability of H₂L made the imaging of Zn²⁺ ions detection safe and rapid. We expect that H₂L to be a powerful tool for early diagnosis of prostate cancer and a good indicator for the precise resection of cancer tissue during surgery.

Keywords: Fluorescent sensor; Imaging diagnosis; Peptide; Prostate cancer cells; Zn2+ ions.