DeRatt BN, et al. – Researchers undertook both targeted and untargeted metabolomic analyses to assess the impact of an elevated plasma cystathionine concentration on metabolic status in adults with stable angina pectoris (SAP). Findings demonstrated that in SAP patients, elevated plasma cystathionine concentrations were associated with metabolic perturbations consistent with higher cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk.

Methods

• Researchers carried out NMR and LC-mass spectrometry (MS) metabolomic analyses on a subset of 80 plasma samples from the Western Norway Coronary Angiography Cohort and selected, based on plasma cystathionine concentrations, a group with high cystathionine concentrations [1.32 ± 0.60 μmol/L (mean ± SD); n = 40] and a group with low cystathionine concentrations [0.137 ± 0.011 μmol/L (mean ± SD); n = 40].
• They also conducted targeted and untargeted metabolomic analyses and assessed with the use of Student’s ttests corrected for multiple testing.
• They assessed overall differences between the cystathionine groups by untargeted NMR and LC-MS metabolomic methods and evaluated by partial least squares discriminant analysis (PLS-DA) with significant discriminating metabolites identified with 99% confidence.

Results

• Findings demonstrated that subjects with high cystathionine concentrations had 75% higher plasma lanthionine concentrations (0.12 ± 0.044 μmol/L) than subjects with low cystathionine concentrations [0.032 ± 0.013 μmol/L (P < 0.001)].
• Researchers observed that although plasma homolanthionine concentrations were notably higher than lanthionine concentrations, they were not different between the groups (P = 0.47).
• In addition, PLS-DA results revealed that a high plasma cystathionine concentration in SAP was associated with higher glucose, branched-chain amino acids, and phenylalanine concentrations, lower kidney function, and lower glutathione and plasma PLP concentrations due to greater catabolism.
• Data also highlighted that the high-cystathionine group had a greater proportion of subjects in the postprandial state.