It has been already demonstrated that solid phase microextraction (SPME) can be very useful tool in bioanalysis. For the past few years, number of applications were published were SPME was used for analysis of human specimens in vitro. Recently, the technology was introduced to human studies on larger cohorts and animal research at translational level. Up-to-date results showed that unique features of SPME may facilitate the technology in medical arena, particularly for low invasive tissue analysis and fast quantitative tool when coupled to mass spectrometry. In the talk, the most recent studies on discovery of biomarkers in glioma brain tumors will be presented. The diagnosis of glioma in terms of identification of its type, degree of malignancy as well as the margin between cancerous and healthy tissue is very difficult based on histology. Instead, genotyping is used as a good prognostic factor, but it is time consuming and relatively expensive analysis. For that reason, small molecule markers are searched as potential alternative to current approaches. The results obtained from untargeted metabolomics by in situ SPME followed by LC-MS enabled to select several metabolites having a potential to differentiate gliomas according to their malignancy and type. Moreover, the metabolic phenotype showed very good agreement with the results of genotyping, therefore opening the door for further validation and future implementation of the method in the oncological diagnostics, where conventional methods such as histology fail to support decision with sufficient certainty. Another example to be discussed will be focused on application of SPME-LC-MS to transplantation. The results obtained for animal models showed that SPME can be used for time course study of organ quality assessment, the type of analysis which is inaccessible for biopsy-based methods. The data permitted to observe a dramatic change in metabolic profile of kidney corresponding to transition from ischemic preconditioning phase to depletion of the energy resources and metabolites protecting from oxidative stress and ischemia. Based on the given examples the future perspectives and directions of the technology and its place in routine clinical practice will be discussed.

How can SPME help in decision making process in clinical practice?

255th National Meeting (2018)

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