Differences in Urinary Amino Acid Patterns in Individuals with Different Types of Urological Tumor Urinary Amino Acid Patterns as Markers of Urological Tumors

Abstract

Abstract. Background: Insufficient specificity and invasiveness of currently used diagnostic methods raises the need for new markers of urological tumors. The aim of this study was to find a link between the urinary excretion of amino acids and the presence of urological tumors. Materials and Methods: Using ion-exchange chromatography, we tested urine samples of patients with prostate cancer (n=30), urinary bladder cancer (n=28), renal cell carcinoma (n=16) and healthy volunteers (control group; n=21). Results:In each category, we found a group of amino acids which differed in concentration compared to the control group. These differences were most significant in sarcosine in patients with prostate cancer; leucine, phenylalanine and arginine in those with bladder cancer; and sarcosine, glutamic acid, glycine, tyrosine and arginine in the those with renal cell carcinoma. Conclusion: Results of our research imply a possible connection between the occurrence of specific types of amino acids in the urine and the presence of urological tumors.The incidence of urological malignancies including cancer of the prostate, bladder and kidney is relatively high. Prostate cancer is the second most common malignancy in the United States among men aside from non-melanoma skin cancer, with estimated 172,000 diagnoses and 28,000 deaths in 2014 (1).Bladder cancer is the 11th most commonly diagnosed cancer in the world and 14th leading cause of cancer death (2), while renal cell carcinoma represents 2-3% of all cancer and in most European countries, its incidence is still rising (3).Despite the frequency of these types of cancer, reliable biomarkers still need to be discovered. Many possible biomarkers of prostate cancer have been tested, including prostate cancer antigen 3 (4), alpha-methyl coenzyme A racemase (5), transmembrane protease, serine 2 (TMPRSS2)-ERG, ETS transcription factor (ERG) translocation (6), urinary prostate-specific antigen (PSA) (7) or urinary thiosulfate (8). However, the only routinely used marker is serum PSA, which still causes many controversies due to the non-specificity of its elevation (9).For patients with renal tumors, early diagnosis is crucial, nevertheless the majority of renal masses are detected incidentally during the investigation of unrelated problems. Numerous molecular markers have been tested such as carbonic anhydrase IX (CaIX) (10), vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) (11), hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF) (12), Ki67, p53, phosphatase and tensin homolog (PTEN) and others (13), however none of these has been recommended for routine practice.Bladder cancer is associated with the need for lifelong surveillance by cystoscopy and urine cytology (14) and the highest cost from diagnosis to death among all cancer types (15). Currently tested markers include DNA, RNA, miRNA and protein markers. However, none are routinely used in daily clinical practice.Urine represents an attractive biological material for testing due to the non-invasiveness of its collection, its relative stability during ...

Detection of Novel Urine Markers Using Immune Complexome Analysis in Bladder Cancer Patients: A Preliminary Study

“…Furthermore, our method can detect antigen-antibody complexes which form as a result of immune response under pathological conditions. On the other hand, various factors are reported as disease-specific marker in patients with BC (45,46). Therefore, further studies on the urine levels of our significant BC-related ICantigens are necessary, and the results obtained by such future studies and findings showed by other studies may be important to discuss the diagnostic tools and observation strategies in BC.…”

Plasma metabolomics of oral squamous cell carcinomas based on NMR and MS approaches provides biomarker identification and survival prediction

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