Testing the concept of the interatomic status of the NFE2L2/AP1 pathway as a systemic biomarker for examination stress.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Oxidative status-based interactomic profiling is a promising approach for fundamental integrative cell biology, diagnostics, and therapy. However, this approach has been neither utilized as a method nor tested as a tool. Thus, we aimed (1) to develop an oxidative status pathway state assessment-based analytical procedure relying on NFE2L2/AP1 pathway evaluation, and (2) to preliminarily assess its responsiveness, performance and diagnostic properties when applied to deciphering stress conditions of the academic examination period and academic term. These conditions were chosen as those representing a common model of mild, everyday-life stressors causing shifts in oxidative status. METHODS: To meet the aim of the study, we performed a repetitive-measurements study collating gene expression of NFE2L2/AP1 pathway targets and controllers under the two stress conditions using semi-quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction. RESULTS: Surprisingly, even with some sensitivity limitations of the methods employed, a pathway state analysis approach based on a multiple target-to-controller ratio calculation was highly responsive and yielded very high receiver operating characteristics in deciphering the model stress conditions. CONCLUSION: Although further testing of the approach is required, the interactomic pathway activation assaying concept was preliminarily experimentally proven to be a highly promising clinical diagnostic tool that may easily be adapted for current tasks.