Abstract
Pleural Mesothelioma (PM) is an aggressive cancer that attacks thousands of people every year. One of the common treatments is surgery to remove the tumor. Unfortunately, around 11% of patients die from blood clots post-surgery. Current predictive factors such as C-reactive protein, D-Dimer, and abnormal platelet count lack specificity. To date, no blood-based protein biomarkers have been identified to reliably predict PM patients at risk of developing Venous Thromboembolism (VTE) post-surgery. In this study, we present a set of host-response plasma protein candidate biomarkers that could predict patients at risk of developing VTE. We employed a quantitative mass spectrometry-based proteomics approach integrated with a multilayered, structured, and systematic evaluation of candidate biomarkers in a cohort of 18 patients, comprising six mesothelioma cases, six mesothelioma controls, and six lung cancer controls. This is the first step towards personalized treatment plans for PM patients undergoing surgery. This study’s findings can potentially guide subsequent, larger-scale investigations, highlighting the value of small-scale exploratory research.
Data availability
All data generated or analyzed during this study are included in this published article (and its Supplementary Information files). The Supporting Information includes a diagram showing the clinical characteristics of all patients, a table with clinical characteristics of all patients, a table with potential biomarkers associated with VTE, results of up-and down-regulated proteins, and Figures S1 and S2.
The datasets analyzed during the current study are available in the MASSIve repository, MSV000100724, MassIVE Dataset Summary.
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Acknowledgements
The authors thank all the researchers involved with Biomarker Discovery Lab (BDL) of the Diagnostic Accelerator (DxA) at the Wyss Institute at Harvard University. Biomarker discovery is possible because of the generosity of patients’ samples, so we thank all the patients whose samples made this study possible. All human samples were collected in accordance with the Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) human subjects’ protection policy and participants were appropriately consented to Dana Farber Cancer Institute protocol 98 − 063. This work was supported by the Wyss Diagnostics Accelerator’s platform budget and Dr. Bueno’s funding source at BWH.
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AS, SR, RB, and RA conceptualized the study. Experiments were performed by AS, SR, SRM, and BB. Data analysis pipeline was developed by AS, SR, RA, and SRM. The analysis code was written by SRM. Samples were provided by WGR and RB. Study supervision and funding acquisition by RA and DRW. AS, SR, SRM, and RA contributed to the manuscript writing with feedback from all authors.
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Shami-shah, A., Roth, S., Morton, S.R. et al. Candidate biomarkers to identify mesothelioma patients at risk of developing venous thromboembolism post-surgery. Sci Rep (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-39805-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-39805-9
