Assessment of pathological response to therapy using lipid mass spectrometry imaging

Sci Rep. 2016 Nov 14:6:36814. doi: 10.1038/srep36814.

Abstract

In many cancers, the establishment of a patient's future treatment regime often relies on histopathological assessment of tumor tissue specimens in order to determine the extent of the 'pathological response' to a given therapy. However, histopathological assessment of pathological response remains subjective. Here we use MALDI mass spectrometry imaging to generate lipid signatures from colorectal cancer liver metastasis specimens resected from patients preoperatively treated with chemotherapy. Using these signatures we obtained a unique pathological response score that correlates with prognosis. In addition, we identify single lipid moieties that are overexpressed in different histopathological features of the tumor, which have potential as new biomarkers for assessing response to therapy. These data show that computational methods, focusing on the lipidome, can be used to determine prognostic markers for response to chemotherapy and may potentially improve risk assessment and patient care.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Adult
  • Aged
  • Aged, 80 and over
  • Biomarkers, Tumor / analysis
  • Chemotherapy, Adjuvant / methods*
  • Colorectal Neoplasms / diagnostic imaging*
  • Colorectal Neoplasms / drug therapy
  • Colorectal Neoplasms / metabolism
  • Colorectal Neoplasms / pathology
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Lipids / analysis*
  • Liver Neoplasms / diagnostic imaging
  • Liver Neoplasms / drug therapy*
  • Liver Neoplasms / metabolism
  • Liver Neoplasms / secondary*
  • Male
  • Middle Aged
  • Prognosis
  • Spectrometry, Mass, Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption-Ionization / methods*
  • Treatment Outcome

Substances

  • Biomarkers, Tumor
  • Lipids