Testicular germ cell tumors (TGCTs) are predominant in young males (15-44 years). Seminomatous and non-seminomatous TGCTs account for about 98% of all TGCTs cases. In this study, we aimed to compare the sperm proteome of patients with seminomatous and non-seminomatous TGCTs to identify possible protein biomarkers that could help distinguish between them in a non-invasive manner. We analyzed semen samples from patients with seminomatous or non-seminomatous TGCTs (n = 15/group) that were cryopreserved before the start of cancer treatment. Quantitative proteomic analysis was conducted on pooled samples (n = 3/group) and a total of 258 differentially expressed proteins (DEPs) were identified. The overexpression of acrosin precursor (ACR) and chaperonin containing TCP1 subunit 6B (CCT6B) as well as the underexpression of S100 calcium-binding protein A9 (S100A9) in the spermatozoa of patients with non-seminomatous TGCTs were validated by western blotting conducted on individual samples (n = 6 for seminomatous group and n = 6 for non-seminomatous group). Our overall results suggest an association between the higher and faster invasiveness of non-seminomatous TGCTs and the altered protein expressions, providing important information for future studies.
International journal of molecular sciences. 2020 Jul 08*** epublish ***
Manesh Kumar Panner Selvam, Marco G Alves, Tânia R Dias, Peter N Pushparaj, Ashok Agarwal
American Center for Reproductive Medicine, Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, OH 44195, USA., Department of Microscopy, Laboratory of Cell Biology, Institute of Biomedical Sciences Abel Salazar and Unit for Multidisciplinary Research in Biomedicine (UMIB), University of Porto, 4050-313 Porto, Portugal., King Abdulaziz University, Center of Excellence in Genomic Medicine, Jeddah 21589, Saudi Arabia.