Cytokine arrays analysis of plasma from acute mountain sickness susceptible and resistant individuals

Extensive studies have been done on mechanisms of acute mountain sickness (AMS), but AMS biomarkers are still little known. In the present study, we used cytokine arrays analysis to identify novel AMS-associated biomarkers in human plasma. Peripheral blood samples from 23 healthy volunteers were collected and AMS symptoms diagnosed using the Lake Louise Questionnaire (LLQ) after exposure to a high altitude of 3800 m. Plasma samples were pooled at two time points, low altitude (LA, altitude of 400 m) and 9-hour high-altitude exposure (HA, altitude of 3800 m). Protein composition of the samples was tested by a cytokine arrays analysis. After 9 hours of hypobaric hypoxia, a total of 30 cytokines were founded differentially expressed due to high-altitude stressor (fold change > 1.5, P < 0.05), among which 21 cytokines were up-regulated, and 9 cytokines were down-regulated; a total of 164 differentially expressed cytokines were observed (fold change > 1.5, P < 0.05), among which 144 cytokines were up-regulated and 20 cytokines were down-regulated. There are more inflammatory cytokines responding to high altitude in AMSindividuals than AMS+ individuals. Our results suggested that AMSindividuals had more ability to anti-inflammation damage than AMS+ individuals.