Detection of renal allograft dysfunction with characteristic protein fingerprint by serum proteomic analysis

This study aimed to diagnose renal allograft dysfunction with specific biomarkers by serum proteomic analysis. Surface-enhanced laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (SELDI-TOF MS) and bioinformatics (support vector machine and leave-one cross validation) were used to analyze serum proteome. Enrolled patients included 38 biopsy-proved acute rejection (BPAR), 10 acute tubular necrosis (ATN), 24 subclinical rejection (SCR) and 29 stable control recipients verified by protocol biopsy. A characteristic protein profile can be detected in each renal allograft dysfunction group. BPAR patients were differentiated from stable patients with markers of 9710.1, 4971, 6675.5, 8563.8, 6709.2, 9319 and 4476.7 Da with high sensitivity and specificity. ATN can be clearly distinguished from BPAR and stable control. Subclinical rejection differentiated from stable control with markers of 9193.1, 2759.1, 8464.6 Da. The independent blind test yielded with high specificity and sensitivity for each group. Serum proteome analysis by SELDI-TOF MS combined with bioinformatics in renal allograft dysfunction is valuable and promising. Specific markers were detected in each group. Identification of these proteins may prove useful as diagnostic markers for allograft dysfunction and better to elucidate the mechanism of acute rejection.