Utility of Serum Peptidome Patterns of Esophageal Squamous Cell Carcinoma Patients for Comprehensive Treatment

Esophageal cancer (EC) is one of the most common malignant tumors, and the incidence of esophagealsquamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is highest in China. Early diagnosis and effective monitoring are keys tocomprehensive treatment and discovering tumor metastases and recurrence in time. The aim of this studywas to confirm serum peptidome pattern utility for diagnosis of ESCC, and assessment of operation success,postoperative chemotherapy results, tumor metastasis and recurrence. Serum samples were collected from 61patients treated with surgery and chemotherapy and 20 healthy individuals. Spectral data generated with weakcationic-exchanger magnetic beads (WCX-MB) and MALDI-TOF MS by a support vector machine (SVM),were used to construct diagnostic models and system training as potential biomarkers. A pattern consisting of 11protein peaks, separated ESCC (m/z 650.75), operated (m/z 676.61, 786.1, 786.58), postoperative chemotherapy(m/z 622.77, 650.66, 676.46) and tumor metastasis and recurrence (m/z 622.63, 650.56, 690.77, 676.12) from thehealthy individuals with a sensitivity of 100.0% and a specificity of 100.0%. These results suggested that MALDITOFMS combined with MB separation yields significantly higher sensitivity and specificity for the detection ofserum protein in patients with EC patients treated with surgery and chemotherapy.