Plasma Amino Acid Profile in Patients with Aortic Dissection

Aortic dissection (AD), a severe cardiovascular disease with the characteristics of high mortality, is lack of specific clinical biomarkers. In order to facilitate the diagnosis of AD, we investigated plasma amino acid profile through metabolomics approach. Total 33 human subjects were enrolled in the study: 11 coronary heart disease (CHD) patients without aortic lesion and 11 acute AD and 11 chronic AD. Amino acids were identified in plasma using liquid chromatography and mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS), and were further subjected to multiple logistic regression analysis. The score plots of principal component analysis (PCA) and partial least squares-discriminate analysis (PLS-DA) showed clear discrimination of CHD patients with AD, acute AD or chronic AD patients, respectively. The contents of histidine, glycine, serine, citrate, ornithine, hydroxyproline, proline and sarcosine were significant different in acute AD patients comparing with CHD patients. The levels of citrate, GABA, glutamate and cysteine were significant different in chronic AD patients comparing with CHD patients. The contents of glutamate and phenylalanine were significant changed in acute AD patients comparing with chronic AD patients. Plasma aminograms were significantly altered in patients with AD comparing with CHD, especially in acute AD, suggesting amino acid profile is expected to exploit a novel, non-invasive, objective diagnosis for AD.