Guest Editor(s)

• Dr. Wei Zhang

  Department of Preventive Medicine, Center for Genetic Medicine, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA.

  Website | E-mail

Special Issue Introduction

Significant progress in cancer diagnosis and treatment has contributed to improved clinical outcomes for many cancers. However, cancer remains a major health problem around the globe. Early detection of malignant tumors that are still treatable (e.g., surgical removal) is key to lowering cancer-related mortality and improving patient survival. Compared to tissue-based cancer diagnosis approaches that may be limited by for example the issue of tumor heterogeneity, difficulty in obtaining tissue at certain body locations, and possible complications associated with the biopsy procedure, approaches utilizing liquid biopsy (i.e., bodily fluids such as blood, urine, cerebrospinal fluid, saliva, sweat) have been demonstrated as a noninvasive or minimally-invasive, clinically convenient alternative that has been attracting more and more research efforts during the past few years. Specifically, tumor-derived mutational, epigenetic, and transcriptomic features are contained in certain bodily fluids from a patient, thus providing the rationale for developing cancer biomarkers based on these specimens. Furthermore, during the past few years exciting technical advances have emerged to allow profiling various molecular targets in a variety of clinical specimens. In this special issue, we are interested in publishing original articles, reviews, short communications, and technical notes that cover the broad area of cancer early diagnosis using liquid biopsy.

Keywords

Liquid biopsy, cancer, precision oncology, early diagnosis

Submission Deadline

31 May 2020

Submission Information

Articles of special issue are free of charge for article processing.
For Author Instructions, please refer to http://jcmtjournal.com/pages/view/author_instructions
For Online Submission, please login at https://oaemesas.com/jcmt
Submission Deadline: 31 May 2020
Contacts: Elaine Gao, managing editor, editorialoffice@jcmtjournal.com
Ivory Ma, assistant editor, editor_3@oaepublish.com

Planned Papers

Type: Perspective

Title: Extracellular RNAs as Potential Biomarkers for Cancer

Authors: Christine Happel¹, Aniruddha Ganguly², Shashi Amur³, Danilo Tagle¹

Affiliations: 1. National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD 20892, USA
2. National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD 20892, USA
3. Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, Food and Drug Administration, Rockville, MD 20903, USA

Abstract: The discovery that secreted RNA (exRNA) is transported between cells through extracellular vesicles (EVs) suggested that exRNAs plays an important role in intercellular communication. Moreover, exRNAs have utility as biomarkers of disease. However, many gaps in knowledge and technical challenges in EVs and exRNA biology, such as mechanisms of EV biogenesis and uptake, exRNA cargo selection, and exRNA detection remain. The NIH Common Fund-supported exRNA Communication Consortium (ERCC) was launched in 2013 to address the major scientific challenges in this field. This article will focus on scientific highlights particularly in biomarker discovery of EV-based exRNA in cancer and the utility of exRNAs as clinical biomarkers.

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Type: Review

Title: Circulating tumour DNA in the era of smart medicine for breast cancer

Authors: Masakazu Toi, Ravi Velaga

Affiliations: Breast Surgery, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Japan

Abstract: Tumour trail left by cancer cells in blood gives an immense opportunity and hope to identify and treat early stage cancers. Next generation sequencing complemented by advances in bioinformatics paved way for liquid biopsy to help identify the genomic evolution of cancer progression. Although catching early mutational events leading to cancer is still work in progress, circulating tumour DNA has been widely accepted by oncologists as a biomarker in detecting early treatment response or efficacy. Minimal invasive nature of liquid biopsy offers great potential in disease diagnosis, pre & post-surgery monitoring and smart therapeutic choices. Genomic landscape of circulating tumour DNA matching with paired solid tumour could help develop smart medicine.

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Type: Review

Title: Liquid biopsy on Endometrial cancer: un update

Authors: Francesca Malentacchi¹, Chiara Sgromo¹, Serena Pillozzi²

Affiliations: ¹Department of Clinical, Experimental and Biomedical Sciences, University of Florence, Italy
²Medical Oncology Unit, AOU Careggi, Firenze, Italy

Abstract: Liquid biopsy is an emerging tool for the screening, diagnosis and monitoring treatment of cancer. Moreover, the biospecimen contained in liquid biopsy can improve the knowledge in cancer evolution. Endometrial cancer is a tumor usually detect at low stage with good prognosis, but some of them, unexpectedly can evolve to bad prognosis. Up to now no molecular target exists to treat advanced stage or to define the evolution of low stage. This review aims to focus on how the liquid biopsy may be help in the management and cancer characterization of patients affected by endometrial cancer.

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Type: Review

Title: Magnetic Nanotechnologies for Early Cancer Diagnostics With Liquid Biopsies: A Review.

Authors: Diqing Su, Kai Wu, Chaoyi Peng, Renata Saha and Jian-Ping Wang

Affiliations: University of Minnesota

Abstract: Liquid biopsy has become an emerging technology in the detection of cancer related biomarkers as well as the continuous monitoring of cancer treatment. There have been extensive research on the application of magnetic nanotechnologies in liquid biopsies from the separation of target analyte to the detection of cancer biomarkers. Magnetic separation plays an important role in increasing both the efficiency and sensitivity of the liquid biopsy process. The detection of cancer biomarkers through magnetic nanosensors also possesses many advantages such as low background noise, high sensitivity, short assay time and the ability to detect multiple biomarkers at the same time. This review will focus on the recent advances of magnetic nanotechnologies in liquid biopsies for cancer detection and its future potential in comparison with other technologies.

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