Diseases of the anterior segment of the eye may present different mechanisms, intensity of symptoms, and impact on the patients’ quality of life and vision. The tear film is in direct contact with the ocular surface and cornea and can be easily accessed for sample collection, figuring as a promising source of potential biomarkers for diagnosis and treatment control. This study aimed to evaluate tear proteomic profile in 3 distinct ocular diseases: keratoconus (corneal ectasia), severe dry eye related to graft-versus-host-disease (tear film dysfunction and ocular inflammatory condition) and pterygium (conjunctival fibrovascular degenerative disease). Tear samples were collected from patients of each condition and a control group. By using mass spectrometric analysis combined with statistics and bioinformatics tools, a detailed comparison of protein profile was performed. After Student’s t-test analyses comparing each condition to the control group, we found the following number of differentially expressed proteins: 7 in keratoconus group, 29 in pterygium group, and 79 in GVHD group. Following multivariate analyses, we also report potential candidates as biomarkers for each disease. We demonstrated herein that mass spectrometry-based proteomics was able to indicate proteins that differentiate three distinct ocular conditions, which is a promising tool for the diagnosis of ocular diseases.

中文翻译：

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与移植物抗宿主病有关的三种不同眼表疾病：圆锥角膜，翼状，肉和干眼症的眼泪蛋白质组学特征

眼前段疾病可能表现出不同的机制，症状的强度以及对患者生活质量和视力的影响。眼泪膜与眼表和角膜直接接触，可以很容易地获取样品，从而成为诊断和治疗控制的潜在生物标记物的有希望的来源。这项研究旨在评估3种不同的眼部疾病的泪液蛋白质组学特征：圆锥角膜（角膜扩张），与移植物抗宿主病相关的严重干眼症（泪膜功能障碍和眼部炎症性疾病）和翼状（肉（结膜纤维血管退行性疾病）。从每种情况的患者和对照组中收集眼泪样品。通过将质谱分析与统计和生物信息学工具结合使用，进行了蛋白质谱的详细比较。通过学生的t检验分析，将每种情况与对照组进行比较，我们发现了以下差异表达的蛋白质数量：圆锥角膜组7种，翼状group肉组29种，GVHD组79种。经过多变量分析，我们还报告了潜在候选物作为每种疾病的生物标志物。我们在本文中证明了基于质谱的蛋白质组学能够指示区分三种不同眼部疾病的蛋白质，这是诊断眼部疾病的有前途的工具。我们还报告了潜在候选物作为每种疾病的生物标记。我们在本文中证明了基于质谱的蛋白质组学能够指示区分三种不同眼部疾病的蛋白质，这是诊断眼部疾病的有前途的工具。我们还报告了潜在候选物作为每种疾病的生物标记。我们在本文中证明了基于质谱的蛋白质组学能够指示区分三种不同眼部疾病的蛋白质，这是诊断眼部疾病的有前途的工具。