Potential isotopic test for HCC being developed based on mineral, rock technology

Scientists may have found a way to develop a new blood test for liver cancer using technology that is currently being used to analyze rocks and minerals, according to data presented at The Goldschmidt Conference in Prague.

“There is increasing evidence that copper metabolism is significant in many cancers, and recently it has been found that copper chelation agents, which mop up copper in the body, can slow and perhaps even halt the growth of some tumors,” Vincent Balter, of the Laboratoire de Géologie de Lyon, École Normale Supérieure de Lyon, CNRS, Université de Lyon, in France, said in a press release. “What we have found may go some way to explaining some of the mechanisms of the growth of these tumors.”

Vincent Balter

Balter and colleagues looked at the ratios of different copper isotopes, 65Cu and 63Cu, between 23 men with hepatocellular carcinoma and compared them with 20 normal controls. After the comparison, they found that the blood of patients with HCC had an “enriched quantity of certain isotopes” compared with the control patients, according to the release. The patients with HCC had 0.4 parts per thousand more 63Cu relative to 65Cu compared with the control patients.

“This isotopic signature is not compatible with a dietary origin,” the researchers wrote in the abstract. “It rather reflects the massive reallocation in the body of copper immobilized within cysteine-rich proteins such as metallothioneins.”

In addition, the sulphur isotopes 32S and 34S showed similar characteristics to the copper isotopes. Among the patients with HCC, the blood was approximately 1.5 parts per thousand richer in 32S relative to 34S compared to the controls.

“[This is] an enrichment compatible with the notion that at least 6% of blood sulfur originates from tumor-derived sulphides,” the researchers wrote.

“The findings are interesting and potentially significant,” Balter said in the release. “Preliminary results seem to show that these ratios are in fact reversed in the tumors themselves, which implies that there is a partition of isotopes between the blood and the tumor. … If we can confirm the validity of an isotopic test for HCC, this might have a significant impact on patients who have chronic liver disease, who risk developing liver cancer.” – by Melinda Stevens

Reference:

Balter V, et al. Copper and sulfur isotope variations in liver cancer. Presented at: The Goldschmidt Conference; August 16-21, 2015; Prague.

Disclosures: Healio.com/Hepatology was unable to confirm relevant financial disclosures at the time of publication.