Metabolomic profiles delineate potential roles for gadolinium chloride in the proliferation or inhibition of Hela cells.

Lanthanides (Lns) compounds have been reported to possess contrary effects on cell activity, i.e., promoting cell cycle progression and cell growth by lower concentration treatment, but suppressing cell proliferation and inducing cell apoptosis at higher dosing. However, the cellular processes during the intervention and the possible underlying mechanisms are still not well clarified. Using a combination of high-throughput liquid chromatography (LC) with mass spectrometry (MS), we have investigated the metabolomic profiles of Hela cells following gadolinium chloride (GdCl(3)) treatment in time- and concentration- dependent manners. A total of 48 metabolites released by Hela cells are identified to be differentially expressed (P < 0.05) in different states. Metabolic pathways analyses reveal that the differential metabolites are mainly characterized by increased lipid and amino acid metabolisms and by decreased lipid, amino acid, and carbohydrate metabolisms for cells treated with GdCl(3) at lower and higher concentrations, respectively. Notably, in the higher level GdCl(3) case, the down-expressions of metabolites are predominantly in the glycolytic and the redox pathways. The above results, obtained by using a metabolomic strategy for the first time, disclose that different cell signaling pathways are activated by GdCl(3) treatment with different concentrations, leading to inhibitory or promotional effect on Hela cells.