[SCAN] NMR metabolomics toward diagnosis of central nervous system metastasis

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Title: NMR metabolomics toward diagnosis of central nervous system metastasis

Speaker: Gonçalo Graça

Affiliation: Helena Santos Lab - Cell Physiology and NMR

Abstract:

Metabolomics is the study of endogenous and exogenous metabolites of living organisms and their variation under physiological and pathological conditions. This field has attracted particular attention in biomedicine as a potential strategy to assist diagnosis of disease and prognosis of therapeutic interventions, since metabolites are the functional endpoints of the biological processes, and therefore are closely related to organism phenotype.

In cancer research, metabolomics has been used to study primary tumours and their metastasis with the final goal of identifying biomarkers and potential drug targets. The search for biomarkers in central nervous system (CNS) metastases, namely leptomeningeal metastasis or invasion, from solid tumors, lymphoma and leukaemia, is of particular interest since current diagnosis relies on methods with limited sensitivity (cytology and MRI, sensitivities around 70%).

This presentation will focus on a study based on NMR metabolomic analysis of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and blood serum from patients with aggressive lymphoma. We were able to identify a panel of metabolite markers for the presence of lymphoma cells in CSF, further validated by the analysis of CSF samples from patients in remission during treatment. The results obtained show that the CSF NMR-metabolomics approach is a promising complementary method for diagnosis of leptomeningeal invasion.