ALTERATIONS OF TEAR PROTEINS IN PATIENTS WITH TYPE 1 DIABETES MELLITUS

Type 1 diabetes mellitus is a chronic illness resulting from β-cell destruction, usually leading to absolute insulin deficiency. One of the most common microvascular complications of diabetes is the diabetic retinopathy (DR) which is a leading cause of blindness worldwide. The initially latent disease could lead to vision loss without any serious symptoms. Timely diagnosis and therapy however can significantly decelerate its progress, necessitating regular DR screening or appropriate follow-up of patients with diabetes. Tear fluid is one of the non-invasively obtainable body fluids which have a focus on the pathogenesis of ocular and also some systemic diseases. The tear proteome changes can provide valuable information on biomarker studies.Our aim was to quantify tear proteins in type 1 diabetes mellitus patients with and without retinopathy and to compare protein levels with age- and sex-matched controls using targeted proteomics method.We have developed a targeted proteomic approach for the analysis of tear proteins and have examined the level of lipocalin 1, lactotransferrin, lysozyme C, lacritin, prolactin inducible protein, Zn alpha-2 glycoprotein, colectin 3 bindig protein, demcidin, lipophilin A, Ig lambda chain in tear samples of patients and controls.This research was supported by the project TAMOP­4.2.2.A­11/1 KONYV­2012­0045 and co-financed by the OTKA Grant 108643. Adrienne Csutak is receiver of Janos Bolyai and Lajos Szodoray Fellowships, Éva Csősz is receiver of Janos Bolyai Fellowship and Gergő Kalló was supported by Astellas Pharma Ltd. Fellowship