Creation of "disease metallomics" to understand the relationship between fluctuations of heavy metals/trace elements and diseases

2022 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 21K19321
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Research (Exploratory)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Review Section: Medium-sized Section 47:Pharmaceutical sciences and related fields
• Research Institution: Tohoku University
• Principal Investigator: Saito Yoshiro 東北大学, 薬学研究科, 教授 (70357060)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): 外山 喬士 東北大学, 薬学研究科, 講師 (50720918)
• Project Period (FY): 2021-07-09 – 2023-03-31
• Keywords: メタロミクス / セレン / 生活習慣病 / がん / 亜鉛 / メチル水銀

Outline of Final Research Achievements

The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between changes in heavy metals and several diseases by using comprehensive heavy metal and trace element analysis "metallomics." From the metallomics analysis of biological samples from diseased patients and model animals, several trace metals show significant differences. We established a new analysis method that integrates all the measured elements and clusters them by the UMAP method. We found the clustering of trace element profiles in brain cancers, such as glioblastoma. We further apply this novel analytical method to several diseases and animal models to develop a molecular pathology based on the understanding of various changes in heavy metals and trace elements.

Free Research Field

生化学　細胞生物学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

ICP-MSの高感度化および高精度化が進み、網羅的な微量金属解析“メタロミクス”が開発されてきた。本研究では、メタロミクスを疾患患者検体に適応し、網羅的解析から単一元素の変化を抽出するとともに、得られた測定値を統合し、全体の変化として比較する手法を開発した。本研究より、生体機能の変化を元素全体の変化から捉える新たな手法が開発された。本研究を軸に、疾患を微量元素の変動から理解する新たな学術大系「疾患メタロミクス」を確立する。