Proteomic analysis between pathological scars and normal skin

AIM: To investigate and screen the sensitive proteins in the formation mechanism of pathological scars by comparing the results of differential proteomic analysis between pathological scars and normal skin.METHODS: Two-dimensional gel electrophoresis was used to detect the protein expression profiles in 8 keloid patients, 8 hypertrophic scar patients and 3 matched normal skin patients.The proteins that showed differential expression of over 4-fold change were cut and analyzed by MALDI-TOF/TOF mass spectrometry.RESULTS: A two-dimensional protein profiling comparison between pathological scars and normal skin was successfully established.On average, 2 978 spots in keloid, 2 975 spots in hypertrophic scar and 3 053 spots in normal skin were identified using gel analysis software.Compared with normal skin, there were totally 36 differentially-expressed proteins in keloid and hypertrophic scar identified from the spots of over 4-fold change, including 16 proteins in both keloid and hypertrophic scar (8 up-regulated and 8 down-regulated), 11 only in keloid (9 up-regulated and 2 down-regulated) and 9 only in hypertrophic scar (4 up-regulated and 5 down-regulated).CONCLUSION: Proteomic analysis can identify the proteins with variance of pathological scars versus normal skin, thus providing probable new clues to reveal the formation mechanism of pathological scars.