Gliomas are highly heterogeneous central nervous system(CNS) tumors originating from glial cells that provide structural and metabolic support to neurons1, and are histologically classified into subtypes: astrocytomas, oligodendrogliomas, and ependymomas2. According to the WHO grading system, glioma grades I and II are the low-grade gliomas (LGG), typically characterized by slow growth rates and potential long-term stability, often amenable to surgical resection based on anatomical location. In contrast, grades III and IV are the high-grade gliomas (HGG), predominantly undifferentiated and malignant with highly invasive behavior and poor prognosis3. Current treatments remain limited and largely ineffective; while maximal safe resection combined with postoperative radiotherapy/chemotherapy moderately improves prognosis, significant limitations and toxicities persist due to tumors' diffuse infiltrative growth and indistinct boundaries preventing radical resection4,5. Human gliomas, especially high grades of glioma, are highly vascular malignant tumors whose growth, proliferation, and invasion strongly depend on their abnormal neovascularization, which is a critical hallmark of glioma malignancy6,7. The targeting tumor angiogenesis study has significant scientific merits for therapeutic breakthroughs.
Angiogenesis fundamentally involves endothelial cell proliferation, migration, and differentiation under specific stimuli, with research focusing on regulators: (i) inducers, including vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF)8, vasorin (VASN)9, hypoxia-inducing factor 1 (HIF1)10, transforming growth factor β (TGF-β)11, endocan12, platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF)13, and epidermal growth factor (EGF)14; and (ii) inhibitors, including angiostatin15, endostatin16, platelet-activating factor receptor-1 (TSP-1)17, and tissue inhibitors of metalloproteinases (TIMPs)18. In phase I/II/III brain tumor clinical trials, most anti-angiogenic drugs target VEGF signaling due to its central role in angiogenesis, exemplified by bevacizumab, a monoclonal antibody that inhibits neovascularization through VEGF blockade19,20,21. However, recent phase II/III trials showed no significant overall survival benefit for advanced glioblastoma patients receiving bevacizumab plus lomustine versus lomustine alone19,20,21,22. Critically, anti-VEGF therapy improves vascular abnormalities but only suppresses angiogenesis without direct tumor cytotoxicity and may induce treatment resistance. Consequently, targeting a single or a few angiogenic regulators fails to achieve a radical cure; effective strategies require concurrent suppression of angiogenesis and blockade of tumor invasion and metastasis through vascular pathways. The diagnostic and prognostic value of proteins in gliomas is well-established, yet malignant glioma treatment has seen limited progress over the decades.
Proteomics can globally analyze all proteins in biological samples, including expression profiles, post-translational modifications (PTMs), and interactions, with mass spectrometry (MS)-based techniques, including top-down (TDP) and bottom-up (BUP) approaches. High-throughput MS enables the identification of tens of thousands of proteins per run, making it essential for studying tumor mechanisms and therapeutic target identification. Protein abundance and its PTMs can be identified in glioma tissues and liquid biopsies such as blood and its derivatives23,24,25, cerebrospinal fluid26, and urine27. For tumor vasculature, abnormal protein expressions and PTMs drive pathological vascular changes. The protein alterations in glioma neovascularization can be identified with proteomics, which drives the protocol development for reliable proteomic profiling of glioma neovascularization.
However, neovascular tissues are only one of the components in the entire glioma tissues. Isolation and purification of neovascular tissues from the entire glioma tissues is the key step for accurate quantitative proteomics analysis of glioma angiogenesis. Laser-capture microdissection (LCM)28,29,30,31 is an effective approach to isolate and purify neovascular tissues from entire glioma tissues. It is very hard to obtain a sufficient amount of neovascular tissue proteins for quantitative proteomics. In 2007, a research team tried to use LCM to separate neovascular tissues from grade IV glioma for proteomics analysis, which identified only four proteins with MS32. Subsequently, in 2012, they continuously used LCM to enrich neovascular tissues of grade IV gliomas for quantitative proteomics analysis, which only identified 29 proteins with MS33. Those two glioma angiogenesis proteomics studies show a very low proteomic throughput in glioma angiogenesis, which cannot represent the complex proteomic landscape of glioma angiogenesis.
This protocol developed a procedure that enables the acquisition of sufficient amounts of neovascular proteins for quantitative proteomics analysis of glioma angiogenesis, thereby constructing a large-scale proteomic landscape of tumor angiogenesis. This has significant scientific merit for the discovery of effective angiogenesis-based biomarkers and anti-angiogenesis therapeutic targets/drugs.