Changes of Trace Elements in Aqueous Humor, Blood and Tears and Analysis of Related Factors
Condition: Primary Glaucoma
MeSH terms: Glaucoma
Study type: Observational

Summary: 
      Trace elements are one of the indispensable substances in human body and play an important
      physiological role. Zinc is a trace element second only to iron in organisms, which is widely
      distributed in various systems and organs and plays an important biological role, and
      interacts with other trace elements such as copper and iron. With the improvement of
      detection methods, it is possible to detect the concentration of zinc and other trace
      elements in liquid samples. It is reported in the existing literature that there are
      significant changes in the concentration of trace elements in a variety of eye diseases. Our
      group intends to collect three kinds of samples (aqueous humor, blood and tears) of patients
      with primary glaucoma and age-related cataract who were treated in Sun Yat-sen Eye Center of
      Sun Yat-sen University from March 2020 to March 2021. Normal people with matched age and sex
      were recruited as normal control group (normal control group only collected blood and tear
      samples). Three methods (FI-ICP-MS, metabonomics and genomics) were used to study the
      concentration changes of patients with primary glaucoma in three kinds of body fluid samples,
      and the related factors were analyzed combined with clinical data, so as to provide a
      theoretical basis for studying the pathogenic mechanism and new prevention pathway of primary
      glaucoma.
    

Detailed description: 
      Glaucoma is a group of optic nerve diseases characterized by progressive and irreversible
      degeneration of retinal ganglion cells and their axons. There are different opinions on the
      pathogenesis of glaucoma, which further reflects that the mechanism of glaucoma optic nerve
      injury is still in the exploratory stage, and there is still a long way to go to develop
      effective drugs to prevent or reverse the visual function damage in patients with glaucoma.
      Therefore, on the basis of previous studies, our research group explored and expanded whether
      there were similar pathological changes in patients with clinical glaucoma not only in
      aqueous humor, but also in blood and tear samples, and further studied the mechanism. Three
      kinds of samples (aqueous humor, blood and tears) were collected from patients with primary
      glaucoma and age-related cataract treated in Sun Yat-sen Eye Center of Sun Yat-sen
      University. Normal people with matched age and sex were recruited as normal control group
      (normal control group only collected blood and tear samples). Three methods of inductively
      coupled plasma mass spectrometry (FI-ICP-MS), metabonomics and genomics were used to study
      the concentration changes of patients with primary glaucoma in three kinds of body fluid
      samples, and the related factors were analyzed combined with clinical data, so as to provide
      a new theoretical basis for studying the pathogenic mechanism and new prevention pathway of
      primary glaucoma.
    

Observational model: Case-Control
Time perspective: Prospective
Sampling method: Non-Probability Sample
Study population: 
        Patients with primary glaucoma. Age-related cataract. Normal population.
      
Biospecimen description: 
      Aqueous humor, blood, tears.
    
Keywords: trace element; Age-related cataract; Aqueous humor, blood, tears.; Flow-Injection-Inductively-Coupled-Plasma-Mass-Spectrometry; Metabonomics; Genomics