Urine metabolic profiling for the pathogenesis research of erosive oral lichen planus

Oral lichen planus (OLP) is a relatively common chronic immune-pathological and inflammatory disease and potentially oral precancerous lesion. Erosive OLP patients show the higher rate of malignant transformation than patients with non-erosive OLP. Identifying the potential biomarkers related to erosive OLP may help to understand the pathogenesis of the diseases. Metabolic profiles were compared in control and patient subjects with erosive OLP by using ultra-performance liquid chromatography-quadrupole time-of-flight-mass spectrometry (UPLC-QTOF-MS) coupled with pattern recognition methods An integrative analysis was used to identify the perturbed metabolic pathways and pathological processes that may be associated with the disease. In total, 12 modulated metabolites were identified and considered as the potential biomarkers of erosive OLP. Multiple metabolic pathways and pathological processes were involved in erosive OLP. The dysregulations of these metabolites could be used to explain the pathogenesis of the disease, which could also be the potential therapeutic targets for the disease.