A Luminex Approach to Develop an Anti-Tumor-Associated Antigen Autoantibody Panel for the Detection of Prostate Cancer in Racially/Ethnically Diverse Populations

SIMPLE SUMMARY: This study explored the use of Luminex technology to detect fourteen autoantibodies associated with cancers and optimize an autoantibody panel for the detection of prostate cancer. Twelve autoantibodies were found at significantly higher frequencies in the prostate cancer group. One specific autoantibody, anti-HSP60, was further validated using an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay with a larger sample size. The findings from both the Luminex and ELISA methods were consistent. We then combined three autoantibodies (p16, IMP2, and HSP60) to create a panel that achieved a high accuracy rate in detecting prostate cancer, with a sensitivity of 71.4% and specificity of 95.8%. This panel was evaluated in patients from different race/ethnicity backgrounds, and it showed the best performance in differentiating Hispanic American prostate cancer patients from healthy individuals. Overall, this study presents a promising approach for the detection of prostate cancer using a panel of specific autoantibodies, offering a potential tool for high-throughput screening. ABSTRACT: (1) Background: Autoantibodies to tumor-associated antigens (TAAs) have emerged as promising cancer biomarkers. Luminex technology offers a powerful approach for the simultaneous detection of multiple anti-TAA autoantibodies. (2) Methods: We aimed to utilize Luminex technology to evaluate and optimize a panel of anti-TAAs autoantibodies for detecting prostate cancer (PCa), which included autoantibodies to fourteen TAAs. A total of 163 serum samples (91 PCa, 72 normal controls) were screened to determine the levels of the autoantibodies using the Luminex assay. (3) Results: Twelve autoantibodies exhibited significantly high frequencies ranging from 19.8% to 51.6% in the PCa group. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis revealed area under the curve (AUC) values ranging from 0.609 to 0.868 for the twelve autoantibodies individually. We further confirmed the performance of the HSP60 autoantibody by using an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) in a larger sample comprising 200 PCa sera, 20 benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) sera, and 137 normal control sera. The results obtained from the Luminex assay were consistent with the ELISA findings. We developed a panel consisting of three autoantibodies (p16, IMP2, and HSP60) which achieved an impressive AUC of 0.910 with a sensitivity of 71.4% and a specificity of 95.8%. The panel was also evaluated in PCa patients from different races/ethnicities with the best performance observed in distinguishing the Hispanic American patients with PCa from normal controls. (4) Conclusions: We developed an anti-TAA autoantibody panel for the detection of PCa that exhibits promising performance. This panel holds significant potential as a high-throughput tool to facilitate PCa detection.