A study of structural differences between liver cancer cells and normal liver cells using FTIR spectroscopy

Abstract

Since liver cancer seriously threatens human health, it is very urgent to explore an effective method for diagnosing liver cancer early. In this study, we investigated the structure differences of IR spectra between neoplastic liver cells and normal liver cells. The major differences of absorption bands were observed between liver cancer cells and normal liver cells, the values of A2955/A2921, A1744/A1082, A1640/A1535, H1121/H1020 might be potentially useful factors for distinguishing liver cancer cells from normal liver cells. Curve fitting also provided some important information on structural differences between malignant and normal liver cancer cells. Furthermore, IR spectra combined with hierarchical cluster analysis could make a distinction between liver cancer cells and normal liver cells. The present results provided enough cell basis for diagnosis of liver cancer by FTIR spectroscopy, suggesting FTIR spectroscopy may be a potentially useful tool for liver cancer diagnosis.