Cancer is one of the deadliest diseases in humans and dogs. Nevertheless, most tumor types spread faster in canines, and early cancer detection methods are necessary to enhance animal survival. Here, cerumen (earwax) was tested as a source of potential biomarkers for cancer evaluation in dogs. Earwax samples from dogs were collected from tumor-bearing and clinically healthy dogs, followed by Headspace/Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (HS/GC-MS) analyses and multivariate statistical workflow. An evolutionary-based multivariate algorithm selected 18 out of 128 volatile metabolites as a potential cancer biomarker panel in dogs. The candidate biomarkers showed a full discrimination pattern between tumor-bearing dogs and cancer-free canines with high accuracy in the test dataset: an accuracy of 95.0% (75.1–99.9), and sensitivity and specificity of 100.0% and 92.9%, respectively. In summary, this work raises a new perspective on cancer diagnosis in dogs, being carried out painlessly and non-invasive, facilitating sample collection and periodic application in a veterinary routine.

中文翻译：

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使用耵聍作为挥发性生物标志物勘探来源对狗进行癌症评估

癌症是人类和狗最致命的疾病之一。然而，大多数肿瘤类型在犬科动物中传播得更快，早期癌症检测方法对于提高动物生存率是必要的。在这里，耳垢（耳垢）被测试为狗癌症评估的潜在生物标志物的来源。从患有肿瘤和临床健康的狗身上收集狗的耳垢样本，然后进行顶空/气相色谱-质谱 (HS/GC-MS) 分析和多变量统计工作流程。基于进化的多变量算法从 128 种挥发性代谢物中选择了 18 种作为狗的潜在癌症生物标志物。候选生物标志物在测试数据集中显示了荷瘤犬和无癌犬之间的完全区分模式，并且具有很高的准确性：准确度为 95.0% (75.1–99.9)，敏感性和特异性分别为 100.0% 和 92.9%。总之，这项工作为狗的癌症诊断提出了新的视角，它是无痛和非侵入性进行的，有利于兽医常规中的样本收集和定期应用。