Discovery of potential biomarkers in human melanoma cells with different metastatic potential by metabolic and lipidomic profiling

Malignant melanoma, characterized by its ability to metastasize to other organs, is responsible for 90% of skin cancer mortality. To investigate alterations in the cellular metabolome and lipidome related to melanoma metastasis, gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) and direct infusion-mass spectrometry (DI-MS)-based metabolic and lipidomic profiling were performed on extracts of normal human melanocyte (HEMn-LP), low metastatic melanoma (A375, G361), and highly metastatic melanoma (A2058, SK-MEL-28) cell lines. In this study, metabolomic analysis identified aminomalonic acid as a novel potential biomarker to discriminate between different stages of melanoma metastasis. Uptake and release of major metabolites as hallmarks of cancer were also measured between high and low metastatic melanoma cells. Lipid analysis showed a progressive increase in phosphatidylinositol (PI) species with saturated and monounsaturated fatty acyl chains, including 16:0/18:0, 16:0/18:1, 18:0/18:0, and 18:0/18:1, with increasing metastatic potential of melanoma cells, defining these lipids as possible biomarkers. In addition, a partial-least-squares projection to latent structure regression (PLSR) model for the prediction of metastatic properties of melanoma was established, and central metabolic and lipidomic pathways involved in the increased motility and metastatic potential of melanoma cells were identified as therapeutic targets. These results could be used to diagnose and control of melanoma metastasis.