Metabolic fingerprinting of fresh lymphoma samples used to discriminate between follicular and diffuse large B-cell lymphomas

Objective: To investigate if proton nuclear magnetic resonance (¹H NMR) spectroscopy-based metabolic profiling was able to differentiate follicular lymphoma (FL) from diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) and to study which metabolites were responsible for the differences. Materials and Methods: High-resolution ¹H NMR spectra was obtained from fresh samples of lymph node biopsies obtained consecutively at one center (14 FL and 17 DLBCL). Spectra were processed using pattern-recognition methods. Results: Discriminant models were able to differentiate between the two tumor types with a 86% sensitivity and a 76% specificity; the metabolites that most contributed to the discrimination were a relative increase of alanine in the case of DLBCL and a relative increase of taurine in FL. Metabolic models had a significant but weak correlation with Ki67 expression (r² = 0.42; p = 0.002). Conclusions: We have proved that it is possible to differentiate between FL and DLBCL based on their NMR metabolic profiles. This approach may potentially be applicable as a noninvasive tool for diagnostic and treatment follow-up in the clinical setting using conventional magnetic resonance systems.