Abstract
Health state transitions are reflected in characteristic changes in the molecular composition of biofluids. Detecting these changes in parallel, across a broad spectrum of molecular species, could contribute to the detection of abnormal physiologies. Fingerprinting of biofluids by infrared vibrational spectroscopy offers that capacity. Whether its potential for health monitoring can indeed be exploited critically depends on how stable infrared molecular fingerprints (IMFs) of individuals prove to be over time. Here we report a proof-of-concept study that addresses this question. Using Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, we have fingerprinted blood serum and plasma samples from 31 healthy, non-symptomatic individuals, who were sampled up to 13 times over a period of 7 weeks and again after 6 months. The measurements were performed directly on liquid serum and plasma samples, yielding a time- and cost-effective workflow and a high degree of reproducibility. The resulting IMFs were found to be highly stable over clinically relevant time scales. Single measurements yielded a multiplicity of person-specific spectral markers, allowing individual molecular phenotypes to be detected and followed over time. This previously unknown temporal stability of individual biochemical fingerprints forms the basis for future applications of blood-based infrared spectral fingerprinting as a multiomics-based mode of health monitoring.
Highlights
Health state transitions are reflected in characteristic changes in the molecular composition of biofluids
The aim of this study is to evaluate the stability of infrared molecular fingerprints (IMFs) and their spectral markers over time and provide a general understanding of the range of bloodbased biological variability across molecular species, which is a vital prerequisite for any future application of molecular fingerprinting in health monitoring or disease detection
This study addresses questions that are fundamental for the applicability of infrared fingerprinting in health monitoring: First, we test whether infrared spectral fingerprints can be reproducibly and directly obtained from bulk liquid blood serum and plasma samples, and we determine the range of natural biological variation of IMFs from individual volunteers over time
Summary
Health state transitions are reflected in characteristic changes in the molecular composition of biofluids. Any liquid-biopsybased approach to health state monitoring must take natural biological variability, and the reference ranges for parameters that are sensitive to the physiological state of the organism, into account[2,8,9,10] These parameters can be either individual analytes or specific features in a spectral fingerprint. This study addresses questions that are fundamental for the applicability of infrared fingerprinting in health monitoring: First, we test whether infrared spectral fingerprints can be reproducibly and directly obtained from bulk liquid blood serum and plasma samples, and we determine the range of natural biological variation of IMFs from individual volunteers over time (withinperson variation). This lays the foundations for IMF as a promising discriminative and non-invasive method for health monitoring in the future
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