Fast and Slow Skeletal Troponin I in Serum from Patients with Various Skeletal Muscle Disorders: A Pilot Study

BACKGROUND: Detection of skeletal muscle injury is hampered by a lack of commercially available assays for serum markers specific for skeletal muscle; serum concentrations of skeletal troponin I (sTnI) could meet this need. Moreover, because sTnI exists in 2 isoforms, slow (ssTnI) and fast (fsTnI), corresponding to slow- and fast-twitch muscles, respectively, it could provide insight into differential injury/recovery of specific fiber types. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether the 2 isoforms of sTnI and their modified forms are present in the blood of patients with various skeletal muscle disorders. METHODS: Serial serum samples were obtained from 25 patients with various skeletal muscle injuries. Serum proteins were separated by a modified sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis protocol followed by Western blotting for sTnI with monoclonal antibodies specific to ssTnI and fsTnI. RESULTS: We observed (a) intact and, in some cases, degraded sTnI products; (b) evidence of posttranslational modifications in addition to proteolysis; and (c) differential detectability of both skeletal isoforms in the same patient. CONCLUSIONS: It is possible to monitor both sTnI isoforms; this could lead to the development of new diagnostic assays for skeletal muscle damage.