It is called a 'protein corona' and is a protein layer that forms on nanoparticles brought into contact with a biological liquid. The research group coordinated by Giulio Caracciolo of the Department of Molecular Medicine at Sapienza University of Rome has been working on this issue for the last ten years. A pilot study published in the journal Cancers has shown that the coupling of haemoglobin levels in the blood and analysis of the protein corona formed by contact between graphene oxide nanoparticles and blood plasma could be used for the early diagnosis of pancreatic cancer.

"There is a great need for effective tools for the early diagnosis of certain cancers," says Giulio Caracciolo, "and in particular pancreatic adenocarcinoma, which is very difficult to detect in its early stages. Many approaches are focusing on the simultaneous analysis of several markers, but none has proved conclusive. Based on our experience in nanotechnology, we have therefore come up with a different approach based on protein corona, which allows an overall analysis, at a glance, of the entire proteome found in a biological liquid, in this case, plasma."

A few years ago, Giulio Caracciolo's group, comprising physicists, chemists, biologists and biotechnologists, showed that the protein corona formed when plasma comes into contact with a nanomaterial is specific to the type of nanomaterial used and customised. Each individual has his or her own, and recognisable changes occur in the event of disease. In their latest work, conducted thanks to the fundamental support of the AIRC Foundation and carried out in collaboration with Damiano Caputo of the Campus Bio-Medico University Hospital in Rome, Caracciolo and colleagues evaluated the effectiveness of combining blood haemoglobin levels and analysis of the protein corona formed by plasma on graphene oxide in discriminating between the presence and absence of pancreatic cancer.

By comparing the results obtained from around thirty patients with the disease and an equal number of healthy volunteers, the researchers found that the method effectively distinguished between the two situations in more than 90% of cases. 

A fascinating aspect of the work is that the investigation of the protein corona was carried out using a simple and inexpensive technique: agarose gel electrophoresis, which is widely used in biology laboratories worldwide.

"The technique does not allow us to characterise the composition of this protein layer in detail, but it offers a general sketch that seems sufficient for diagnostic purposes," Caracciolo concludes. "If a larger clinical trial confirms the results obtained, this new technique could be used to screen people at risk for pancreatic cancer, such as people with obesity or diabetes."

References:

Synergistic Analysis of Protein Corona and Haemoglobin Levels Detects Pancreatic Cancer- by Damiano Caputo, Luca Digiacomo, Chiara Cascone, Daniela Pozzi, Sara Palchetti, Riccardo Di Santo, Erica Quagliarini, Roberto Coppola, Morteza Mahmoudi and Giulio Caracciolo - Cancers 2021 https://doi.org/10.3390/cancers13010093

Further Information

Giulio Caracciolo
Department of Molecular Medicine
giulio.caracciolo@uniroma1.it