#AI Reads Urine# How Early Can Pancreatic Tumors Be Detected Using NMR-Based Urine Metabolic Profiling?

Pancreatic cancer is extremely dangerous. In the United States, a large number of people are diagnosed with it each year, and many die from this disease. The big problem is that in the early stages, pancreatic cancer shows almost no symptoms, and there aren't reliable methods to detect it early. As a result, it's hard to treat effectively, and the survival rate of patients is quite low.

To solve this problem, researchers conducted a study. They used a group of mice to create a pancreatic cancer model. They took human pancreatic cancer cells named MiaPaCa - 2 and injected them into the pancreases of these mice. These mice had a weakened immune system, which allowed the cancer cells to grow. Another group of mice had a sham operation, where only cell - growth media was injected into their pancreases as a comparison.

The researchers focused on urine metabolic profiling. They collected urine samples from these mice at different times. They started collecting before the injection, then one week after the injection, and continued every two weeks for eight weeks. They used a technique called nuclear magnetic resonance - based metabolic profiling to analyze these urine samples. This method can identify and measure the small molecules, known as metabolites, in the urine.

The most important discovery was in the first week. After analyzing the urine samples from the first week, they found that the levels of 27 potential metabolites in the urine had changed significantly. These metabolites were related to important metabolic pathways. For example, the pathways of pyruvate metabolism, glycolysis/gluconeogenesis, and valine, leucine, isoleucine biosynthesis were affected. The increase in pyruvate metabolism and glycolysis was consistent with the high energy demand of cancer cells. Cancer cells rely a lot on glycolysis to produce energy, even when there is oxygen. Also, elevated gluconeogenesis might be due to the breakdown of lipids and proteins to get glucose during tumor growth.

Besides these, some specific metabolites like alanine, 2 - hydroxybutyrate, and n - methylnicotinamide were also elevated in the first - week urine. Alanine is needed for the growth and metabolism of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) cancer cells, so its increase in urine makes sense. 2 - hydroxybutyrate has been found to be elevated in people with pancreatic cancer and may be involved in promoting the progression of PDAC. N - methylnicotinamide, which is important for tumor formation, might be increased in urine because it can reduce the killing function of T - cells.

In conclusion, this study shows that nuclear magnetic resonance - based urine metabolic profiling has the potential to detect the early stages of pancreatic tumor growth. However, the study has some drawbacks. The tumors in the mice didn't occur naturally, the metabolite identification depends on incomplete databases, and only one type of human pancreatic cancer cell line was used. Future research is needed to improve this method and see if it can be used to detect pancreatic cancer in humans. 

Metabolites 2025, 15(3), 142; https://doi.org/10.3390/metabo15030142

Youhe Gao

Statement: During the preparation of this work the author(s) used Doubao / AI reading for summarizing the content. After using this tool/service, the author(s) reviewed and edited the content as needed and take(s) full responsibility for the content of the published article.