Analysis of Amino Acid Metabolism in Tumors

Cancer cells exhibit a unique metabolic profile, often characterized by altered amino acid metabolism. By dissecting the complex interplay between amino acid pathways and tumor progression, Alfa Cytology empowers clients to uncover novel therapeutic vulnerabilities and advance the development of groundbreaking cancer therapies.

Introduction

Metabolic reprogramming is one of the hallmarks of tumors, and methods to increase the killing of cancer cells have been investigated by blocking different metabolic pathways in tumors. Among them, all amino acids have a complex metabolic network that is highly interconnected with other pathways. Amino acid metabolism has an extremely broad role in tumor cells, including but not limited to (1) building amino acid pools as building blocks, especially to produce non-essential amino acid nitrogenous metabolites for protein biosynthesis, conversion to glucose, lipids and precursors; as nutritional signals, activating important pathways; or as neurotransmitters. (2) Epigenetic modifications. (3) Provides bioenergy through production of 伪-keto acids, ultimately producing ATP via the tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle and oxidative phosphorylation.(4) Detoxification of ammonia through conversion to non-toxic urea. (5) Maintenance of intracellular redox status. Thus, abnormal amino acid metabolism has multiple important roles in various tumors, and the potential impact of metabolic regulation on the tumor microenvironment is becoming increasingly important.

Fig.1 Metabolic pathways of amino acids in cancer. (Wei, Z., et al.;, 2021)

Our Services

Alfa Cytology has established an innovative technology platform for the tumor microenvironment center and is developing a variety of technologies to provide high quality solutions and services to our global collaborators. The scientific experiments aim to investigate recent advances in amino acid metabolism in the context of tumor and tumor microenvironment (TME), revealing their interlinked or integral roles in tumor growth, epigenetic modifications, cancer immunity and iron death, and providing a theoretical basis for therapies that potentially target amino acid metabolism.

Key Technologies

Amino acid metabolomics provides an important reference for disease mechanism research, health diagnosis, disease screening, clinical diagnosis and nutritional assessment. With the continuous development of histology technology, it has become possible to systematically analyze the molecular mechanism of action and in vivo dynamics of amino acids by integrating histological data through the concept and method of systems biology. Alfa Cytology has rich experience in providing amino acid metabolomics project solutions with our advantageous technology platform and rich research experience in collaboration with many universities and research institutions around the world. We use HPLC, amino acid auto-analyzer, GC-MS and LC-MS/MS platforms to ensure better separation of many types of amino acids. Targeted quantification of amino acids can also be achieved using a variety of isotopically labeled amino acids as internal standards, allowing for customized analysis of multiple free amino acids in your samples.

As one of the world's leading companies in the field of tumor microenvironment (TME) research, Alfa Cytology is committed to supporting researchers in making groundbreaking scientific discoveries and developing new applications to accelerate new drug discovery and scientific diagnosis and treatment. With years of experience in the field of TME, we are ready to provide reliable solutions and quality services to our customers. If you have any special needs or questions, please feel free to contact us for support from our experienced experts.

Reference

1. Wei, Z., et al.; (2021). Metabolism of amino acids in cancer. Frontiers in cell and developmental biology, 8, 603837.

For research use only.