Delineating metabolic dysfunction in cellular metabolism of oral submucous fibrosis using H nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy.

Objective: To delineate the metabolism involved in oral submucous fibrosis progression towards carcinogenesis by H nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy.

Methods: The proposed study was designed using H-NMR by comparing the metabolites in the serum sample of oral submucous fibrosis (n = 20) compared to the normal group (n = 20) using H nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. Various statistical analysis like multivariate statistical analysis, Principle component analysis, Partial least squares Discriminant Analysis, Hierarchical cluster analysis was applied to analyze potential serum metabolites.

Results: The results generated from the principle component analysis, partial least squares discriminant analysis and hierarchical cluster analysis are sufficient to distinguish between oral submucous fibrosis group and normal group. A total of 15 significant metabolites associated with main pathways were identified, which correlated with the progression of cancer. Up-regulation of glucose metabolism-related metabolites indicated the high energy demand due to enhanced cell division rate in the oral submucous fibrosis group. A significant increase in lipid metabolism-related metabolites revealed the reprogramming of the fatty acids metabolic pathway to fulfilling the need for cell membrane formation in cancer cells. On the other hand, metabolites related to choline phosphocholine, the metabolic pathway was also altered.

Conclusion: Our findings could identify the differentiating metabolites in the oral submucous fibrosis group. Significant alteration in metabolites in the oral submucous fibrosis group exhibited deregulation in metabolic events. The findings reported in the study can be beneficial to further explain the molecular aspects that lead to the progression of oral submucous fibrosis towards carcinogenesis.