Bioinformatics processing of protein and transcript profiles of normal and transformed cell lines indicates functional impairment of transcriptional regulators in buccal carcinoma.

Normal and two transformed buccal keratinocyte lines were cultured under a standardized condition to explore mechanisms of carcinogenesis and tumor marker expression at transcript and protein levels. An approach combining three bioinformatic programs allowed coupling of abundant proteins and large-scale transcript data to low-abundance transcriptional regulators. The analysis identified previously proposed and suggested novel protein biomarkers, gene ontology categories, molecular networks, and functionally impaired key regulator genes for buccal/oral carcinoma. Keywords: cancer biomarkers • proteomics • transcriptomics • oral cancer • gene ontology • molecular networks • transcription factors • cultured oral keratinocytes • serum-free conditions