Application of two-dimensional difference gel electrophoresis to identify protein changes between center, margin, and adjacent non-tumor tissues obtained from non-small-cell lung cancer with adenocarcinoma or squamous cell carcinoma subtype
Source : https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0268073
Lung cancer is responsible for the most cancer-related mortality worldwide and the mechanism of its development is poorly understood. Proteomics has become a powerful tool offering vital knowledge related to cancer development. Using a two-dimensional difference gel electrophoresis (2D-DIGE) approach, we sought to compare tissue samples from non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients taken from the tumor center and tumor margin.
Conclusion: We identified several proteins that are important for the better characterization of tumor development and molecular specificity of both lung cancer subtypes. We also identified proteins that may be important as biomarkers and/or targets for anticancer therapy.
• Source: PLOS ONE
• Conclusion: “We identified several proteins that are important for the better characterization of tumor development and molecular specificity of both lung cancer subtypes. We also identified proteins that may be important as biomarkers and/or targets for anticancer therapy.”
• The researchers compared NSCLC proteomes representing the tumor center and margin (i.e., tumor progression). They assessed adenocarcinoma (ADC) and squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) and hypothesized that these two tumor types would differ in their proteomic profiles, thus reflecting different metabolic and structural characteristics. They also compared the tumor center and margin were with the proteome of adjacent normal lung tissues in both of tumor types.
• The researchers found that proteins that differentiated the tumor center and margin were associated with various aspects of cancer invasion including cell migration, adhesion and invasion, cytoskeletal structure, protein folding, anaerobic metabolism, tumor angiogenesis, epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT), epithelial adherens junctions (AJs), and inflammatory responses. The authors isolated various new proteins differentiating tumor and control tissues—in particular, those involving high-fold changes. These new proteins could make for new tumor biomarkers.
• “We identified several canonical pathways related to tumor progression,” the authors stated. “These pathways often overlap, indicating their involvement in several specific mechanisms of ADC tumorigenesis. Important physiological phenomena related to cancer invasion were identified, especially including EMT and AJs. Moreover, the functional categories highlight functions related to cell death and survival and cell movement, which indeed are related to cancer invasion. Several proteins were categorized to different cancers, which strongly suggests that they are part of a general mechanism of carcinogenesis. It should be underlined that all signature pathways were predicted by <5 molecules therefore further studies are necessary to validate our results by other analytical approaches, such as IHC, WB, or ELISA.”