Abstract
Detection of Circulating Tumor Cells (CTCs) in peripheral blood can serve as a “liquid biopsy” approach and as a source of valuable tumor markers. CTCs are rare, and thus their detection, enumeration and molecular characterization are very challenging. CTCs have the unique characteristic to be non-invasively isolated from blood and used to follow patients over time, since these cells can provide significant information for better understanding tumour biology and tumour cell dissemination. CTCs molecular characterization offers the unique potential to understand better the biology of metastasis and resistance to established therapies and their analysis presents nowadays a promising field for both advanced and early stage patients. In this chapter we focus on the latest findings concerning the clinical relevance of CTC detection and enumeration, and discuss their potential as tumor biomarkers in various types of solid cancers. We also highlight the importance of performing comparison studies between these different methodologies and external quality control systems for establishing CTCs as tumor biomarkers in the routine clinical setting.
Keywords
- Breast cancer
- Cancer stem cells
- Circulating tumor cells (CTC)
- Circulating tumour stem cells
- CK-19
- Colorectal cancer
- Epcam
- Gastrointestinal Cancers
- Hepatocellular carcinoma
- Individualized treatment
- Liquid biopsy
- Lung cancer
- Melanoma
- Migrating cancer stem cells
- Molecular characterization
- Non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC)
- Oncoproteomics
- Overall survival (OS)
- Pancreatic cancer
- Peripheral blood
- Predictive biomarkers
- Prognostic biomarkers
- Progression free survival (PFS)
- Prostate cancer
- Tumor biomarkers
- Solid cancer
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- AA:
-
Abiraterone acetate
- AR:
-
Androgen receptor
- BC:
-
Breast cancer
- CRPC:
-
Castration-resistant prostate cancer
- CA-15-3:
-
Cancer antigen 15–3
- CEA:
-
Carcinoembryonic antigen
- cfDNA:
-
Cell free DNA
- CTCs :
-
Circulating Tumor Cells
- CK-19 :
-
Cytokeratin-19
- CK-7:
-
Cytokeratin-7
- DFS:
-
Disease Free Survival
- DTC:
-
Disseminated tumor cells
- EGFR:
-
Epidermal growth factor receptor
- EMT:
-
Epithelial-Mesenchymal Transition
- EQA:
-
External quality assurance
- CNA:
-
Genome-wide copy-number aberration
- HCC:
-
Hepatocellular carcinoma
- hTERT:
-
Human telomerase reverse transcriptase
- ISET:
-
Isolation by size of epithelial tumour cells
- LAPC:
-
Locally advanced pancreatic carcinoma
- LAHNC:
-
Locally advanced head and neck cancer
- LOH:
-
Loss of heterozygosity
- MBC:
-
Metastatic breast cancer
- mCRC:
-
Metastatic colorectal cancer
- NIH:
-
National Institutes of Health
- NSCLC:
-
Non small cell lung cancer
- OS:
-
Overall Survival
- PE:
-
Pleural Effusion
- PFS:
-
Progression Free Survival
- PSA :
-
Prostate Specific Antigen
- RT-PCR:
-
Reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction
- SLN:
-
Sentinel lymph node
- SNP:
-
Single-nucleotide polymorphism
- SNUC:
-
Sinonasal undifferentiated carcinoma
- SCCHN:
-
Squamous cell carcinoma of head and neck
- TTF-1:
-
Thyroid transcription factor 1
- TGF-P:
-
Transforming growth factor
- TMPRSS2:
-
Transmembrane protease serine 2
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Lianidou, E.S., Markou, A., Strati, A. (2015). The Role of CTCs as Tumor Biomarkers. In: Scatena, R. (eds) Advances in Cancer Biomarkers. Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology, vol 867. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-7215-0_21
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