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Updated: Mar 9, 2026
Quantification of Endothelial Fatty Acid Uptake using Fluorescent Fatty Acid Analogs
Published on: August 15, 2025
Metabolic profiling of human endothelial cells during autophagy assessed in a biomimetic microfluidic device model
Cezar Rangel Pestana1, Ana Carolina Urbaczek2, Juliana Vieira Alberici2
1Instituto Latino-Americano de Ciências da Vida e da Natureza, Universidade Federal da Integração Latino-Americana, Foz do Iguaçu, PR, Brazil.
Aims:
Autophagy is critical to endothelial function. We explored the effects of autophagy induced by serum deprivation on Human Umbilical Vascular Endothelial Cells (HUVEC) metabolome profile and its inhibition by the antimalarial drug chloroquine (CLQ) using a microfluidic biomimetic model.
Main Methods:
The metabolites secreted by HUVEC into the circulating microfluidics were determined by liquid chromatography mass spectrometry (LC-MS) and further analyzed using Metaboanalyst 3.0 multivariate and pathway analysis tools.
Key Findings:
Principal component analysis showed the discrimination of metabolites between treated and control groups. The results also identified alterations in metabolites relevant to endothelial function such as arginine, glutamate and energy metabolism pathways. Interestingly, CLQ mostly reversed the changes induced by serum deprivation.
Significance:
The knowledge of endothelial metabolic profile during autophagy may contribute to the identification of clinical biomarkers and potential therapeutic approaches based on the regulation of autophagy.
