A universal pre-analytic solution for concurrent stabilization of salivary proteins, RNA and DNA at ambient temperature

ObjectiveSaliva is a biofluid that can be obtained from individuals without supervision by health care providers. To maximize this clinical advantage, it is highly desirable to have a global salivary analyte stabilizer for proteins, RNA and DNA at ambient temperature.DesignWhole saliva, saliva supernatant and saliva filtrate (5.0 μm) were treated with RPS at room temperature (RT) for up to 6 days and then subjected to SDS-PAGE. Immunoblotting of β-actin and cystatin C were used to evaluate protein stability. For salivary DNA/RNA, whole saliva was incubated with RPS at RT for up to 10 weeks. After extracting total DNA/RNA in samples at week 0, 2, 6 and 10, DNA stability was assayed by chromosome 18 DNA qPCR and RNA stability by β-actin mRNA RT-qPCR.Resultsβ-actin completely degraded in all types of saliva samples after 6-day incubation at RT. However, 24.0%, 91.4% and 89.3% of β-actin remained intact with RPS for whole saliva, saliva supernatant and filtrate, respectively. Similarly, 70.3% of cystatin C in supernatant remained intact in the presence of RPS. For salivary DNA/RNA, the cycle threshold (Ct) values showed no significant change for chromosome 18 DNA and β-actin mRNA in RPS-incubated saliva during the 10-week time course while significant increase in Ct values were observed in controls without RPS for both β-actin mRNA and DNA.ConclusionsRPS provided effective concurrent stabilization to salivary DNA/RNA in whole saliva for up to 10 weeks and proteins in saliva filtrate for 6 days at RT. We also achieved separation of saliva supernatant from cellular elements by a simple filtration step (bypassing the need for centrifugation).