Plasma Metabolomics Analysis Based on GC-MS in Infertile Males with Kidney-Yang Deficiency Syndrome

INTRODUCTION: Chinese medicine syndrome diagnosis is the key requisite in the treatment of male infertility with traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). Kidney-Yang deficiency syndrome (KYDS) is the critical Chinese medicine syndrome of male infertility. To explore the modernized mechanisms of KYDS in male infertility, this study aims to investigate the metabolomics of males with KYDS. METHODS: The gas chromatography-mass spectrometry method was applied to analyze the plasma samples of 67 infertile males with KYDS compared with 55 age-matched healthy controls. The chemometric methods including principal component and partial least squares-discriminate analyses were employed to identify the potential biochemical patterns. With the help of the variable importance for the projection and receiver operating characteristic curve analyses, the potential biomarkers were extracted to define the clinical utility. Simultaneously the high-quality KEGG metabolic pathways database was used to identify the related metabolic pathways. RESULTS: The metabolomics profiles of infertile males with KYDS including 10 potential biomarkers and six metabolic pathways were identified. They precisely distinguished infertile males with KYDS from healthy controls. CONCLUSIONS: These potential biomarkers and pathways suggest the substantial basis of infertile males with KYDS. The metabolomics profiles highlight the modernized mechanisms of infertile males with KYDS.