EX-VIVO 2-DIMENSIONAL PROTON NUCLEAR-MAGNETIC-RESONANCE SPECTROSCOPY OF SMOOTH-MUSCLE TUMORS - ADVANTAGES OF TOTAL CORRELATED SPECTROSCOPY OVER HOMONUCLEAR J-CORRELATED SPECTROSCOPY

Two-dimensional total correlated proton nuclear magnetic resonance spe ctroscopy (TOCSY) at 600 MHz was used for an ex vivo biochemical analy sis of a benign human smooth muscle tumor (leiomyoma) and high grade m alignant smooth muscle tumor (leiomyosarcoma). While there are a numbe r of applications of proton nuclear magnetic resonance magnitude-mode two-dimensional correlated spectroscopy (COSY) to the ex vivo study of tissues and cells in the literature, to our knowledge this is the fir st application of TOCSY for the ex vivo study of biological tissue. Co mparison of TOCSY and purged COSY data demonstrate the potential sensi tivity advantages of the TOCSY method for the study of heterogeneous b iological tissues. These TOCSY spectra were used to identify and quant itate a wide range of metabolites such as amino adds, peptides, trigly cerides, phospholipid precursors and degradation products, bound fucos e, and other saccharides. The leiomyosarcoma was found to have 5-fold higher levels of triglycerides and a 7-fold increase in the glyceropho sphocholine-choline ratio compared to the leiomyoma. These metabolite changes may enhance membrane fluidity in the leiomyosarcoma compared t o leiomyoma and thus may be of fundamental importance to cell motility , recognition, sarcoma tumorigenesis, and metastatic potential.