Tumor-related inflammatory mediators play a vital role in the host tumor defense response by intensifying tumor growth and evading the immune response. For the first time, a liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometric (LC-MS/MS) and multiplex-based proteomic approach was utilized for the profiling of acute response proteins in RCC patients from Pakistan. We evaluated the potential role of inflammatory modifiers in RCC and adjacent normal samples using DAVID, GAD, and enriched KEGG pathways. Databases revealed the association of enriched KEGG pathways with dataset proteins involved in bladder cancer, transcriptional misregulation, proteoglycans, and microRNAs in cancer, suggesting the potential roles of these mediators in tumorigenesis. A panel of six proteins were quantified by multiplexed bead assay in the sera of samples with hepatocyte growth factor (HGF), tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinases-1 TIMP1, TIMP4, apolipoprotein A1 (APOA1), ferritin (FR), and osteopontin (OPN). Our results indicated that OPN, APOA1, and TIMP4 in particular possess high potential in discriminating RCC subjects from healthy individuals ( P 0.96. The differential expression of inflammatory proteins is associated with tumor progression and may serve as potential biomarkers of RCC.
Akhtar et al. (Sun,) studied this question.