Abstract 451P
Background
Oral Submucous Fibrosis (OSMF) is a chronic debilitating disease more frequently found in the South East Asian population. This disease poses a public health priority, as it is grouped under oral potentially malignant disorders, with malignant transformation rates of around 7 to 13%. Hence, early identification of high-risk OSMF patients is of the utmost importance to prevent malignant transformation. Proteomic expression profiling is a promising method for identifying differentially expressed proteins for disease prognosis and risk stratification in OSMF.
Methods
In the current study, overexpressed proteins in different clinical stages of OSMF (n=20), OSMF transformed into oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) (n=5) and healthy control tissues (n=5) were evaluated by proteomic analysis using two-dimensional electrophoresis and mass spectrometry, which revealed differential expression of 30 proteins.
Results
The identified proteins were mainly involved in cellular processes, biological regulation and molecular functions. The proteins namely KDR (1.55-fold), RAB37 (2.19-fold), MRPL50 (2.16-fold), NDC80(1.88-fold), TBL3 (4.63-fold), ALB (4.06-fold), CRYZL1 (2.50-fold), SLC25A23 (4.36-fold), FBX036 (4.41-fold) and SLC25A11 (2.06-fold) showed significant overexpression in OSMF stage IV, OSCC in comparison to healthy control. Validation was done using immunohistochemistry for three secretory proteins, namely RAB37 (n = 125), MRPL50 (n = 125) and vascular endothelial growth factor receptor (KDR) (n = 125), which showed significant overexpression in OSMF, OSCC compared to normal.
Conclusions
The present study is the first of its kind in India to the best of our knowledge, assessing the altered expression of proteins in different clinical stages of OSMF and OSMF cases which has undergone a malignant transformation, obtaining a better knowledge of the molecular pathways involved in the disease progression. The current study shows that the biomarkers studied can be potentially useful for risk stratification of OSMF to OSCC serving as novel targets for therapeutic intervention.
Clinical trial identification
Editorial acknowledgement
Legal entity responsible for the study
V. Ramshankar.
Funding
Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) – Sanction Letter No. 5/4/2-4/Oral Health/2021-NCD-II.
Disclosure
All authors have declared no conflicts of interest.