Advances of Salivary Proteomics in Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma (OSCC) Detection: An Update

Abstract

Oral cancer refers to malignancies that have higher morbidity and mortality rates due to the late stage diagnosis and no early detection of a reliable diagnostic marker, while oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) is amongst the world’s top ten most common cancers. Diagnosis of cancer requires highly sensitive and specific diagnostic tools which can support untraceable hidden sites of OSCC, yet to be unleashed, for which plenty of biomarkers are identified; the most recommended biomarker detection medium for OSCC includes biological fluids, such as blood and saliva. Saliva holds a promising future in the search for new clinical biomarkers that are easily accessible, less complex, accurate, and cost effective as well as being a non-invasive technique to follow, by analysing the malignant cells’ molecular pathology obtained from saliva through proteomic, genomic and transcriptomic approaches. However, protein biomarkers provide an immense potential for developing novel marker-based assays for oral cancer, hence this current review offers an overall focus on the discovery of a panel of candidates as salivary protein biomarkers, as well as the proteomic tools used for their identification and their significance in early oral cancer detection.

Salivary proteome profiling of oral squamous cell carcinoma in a Hungarian population

“…The alpha‐1‐acid glycoprotein, alpha‐1B glycoprotein, alpha‐amylase, beta‐2‐glycoprotein, carbonic anhydrase 1, cystatin‐SA, hemopexin, phosphoglycerate kinase, and serum albumin were identified as potential salivary markers of OSCC .…”

“…A potential way of improving our diagnostic tools is to perform in‐depth salivary analyses to discover and to assess biochemical and immunological markers in the saliva for early oral cancer diagnosis . Biomarkers identified in the last decades in biological fluids can be linked to carcinogenesis and may serve as prognostic factors and saliva is a new clinical biomarker source that can be easily collected by noninvasive means . As there is direct contact between saliva and the oral lesion(s), disease‐related concentration changes of saliva ingredients may provide as good or better clues than serum samples .…”

Salivary Circular RNAs Hsa_Circ_0001874 and Hsa_Circ_0001971 as Novel Biomarkers for the Diagnosis of Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma

“…Salivary screening is currently the best choice as the primary screening test for highrisk cases of OSCC because the collection procedure is noninvasive and low cost [21,22]. Several studies have demonstrated the feasibility of using salivay miRNAs and long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) as potential biomarkers of OSCC [23,24].…”

Advancing Point-of-Care (PoC) Testing Using Human Saliva as Liquid Biopsy

“…The human saliva revolution in medical and dental sciences through its property as a "mirror of body health" in the last decade brought many disease detections through its compositional changes in disease conditions [5]. Human oral cavity consists of different sources, such as salivary glands (major and minor), gingival crevicular fluid (GCF), microbes, and oral epithelial sheds for the production of whole mouth fluid (WMF) [6][7][8][9][10][11][12]. This fluid is 99% water, but 1% consists of DNA, mRNA, microRNA, proteins, metabolites, and microbiota which are utilised as a diagnostic fluid for disease analysis and even for forensic analysis [13,14].…”