Plasma membrane proteomic analysis of human Gastric Cancer tissues: revealing flotillin 1 as a marker for Gastric Cancer

BACKGROUND: Gastric cancer remains the second leading cause of cancer-related deaths in the world. Successful early gastric cancer detection is hampered by lack of highly sensitive and specific biomarkers. Plasma membrane proteins participate and/or have a central role in the metastatic process of cancer cells and are potentially useful for cancer therapy due to easy accessibility of the targets. METHODS: In the present research, TMT method followed by mass spectrometry analysis was used to compare the relative expression levels of plasma membrane proteins between noncancer and gastric cancer tissues. RESULTS: Of a total data set that included 501 identified proteins, about 35% of the identified proteins were found to be plasma membrane and associated proteins. Among them, 82 proteins were at least 1.5-fold up- or down-regulated in gastric cancer compared with the adherent normal tissues. CONCLUSIONS: A number of markers (e.g. annexin A6, caveolin 1, epidermal growth factor receptor, integrin beta 4) were previously reported as biomarkers of GC. Additionally, several potential biomarkers participated in endocytosis pathway and integrin signaling pathways were firstly identified as differentially expressed proteins in GC samples. Our findings also supported the notion that flotillin 1 is a potential biomarker that could be exploited for molecular imaging-based detection of gastric cancer. Together, the results show that subcellular proteomics of tumor tissue is a feasible and promising avenue for exploring oncogenesis. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12885-015-1343-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.