Altered plasma metabolite levels can be detected years before a glioma diagnosis

Abstract

Genetic and metabolic changes in tissue and blood are reported to occur several years before glioma diagnosis. Since gliomas are currently detected late, a liquid biopsy for early detection could affect the quality of life and prognosis of patients. Here, we present a nested case-control study of 550 prediagnostic glioma cases and 550 healthy controls from the Northern Sweden Health and Disease study (NSHDS) and the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) study. We identified 93 significantly altered metabolites related to glioma development up to 8 years before diagnosis. Out of these metabolites, a panel of 20 selected metabolites showed strong disease correlation and a consistent progression pattern toward diagnosis in both the NSHDS and EPIC cohorts, and they separated future cases from controls independently of biological sex. The blood metabolite panel also successfully separated both lower-grade glioma and glioblastoma cases from controls, up to 8 years before diagnosis in patients within the NSHDS cohort and up to 2 years before diagnosis in EPIC. Pathway enrichment analysis detected metabolites related to the TCA cycle, Warburg effect, gluconeogenesis, and cysteine, pyruvate, and tyrosine metabolism as the most affected.