Liquid Biopsy - Its increasing role in aiding biomarker development
"Liquid biopsy" has been gaining value in medical diagnostics, especially for cancer studies.
Due to the increased cancer incidence worldwide, improvements to pre-existing diagnostic and treatment methods are necessary, with emphasis on early and predictive diagnosis as well as minimally invasive diagnosis. This need for advancement has led to a shift towards the molecular study of biomarkers through liquid biopsies.
Biospecimens like blood, urine, and saliva contain biomarkers such as circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA), circulating tumor cells (CTCs), and microRNA. These biomarkers aid clinical research, diagnosis, and treatment.
In this article, we will look at the advantages of liquid biopsy, the importance of high-quality biospecimens, and the future implications of these developments for research and treatments.
Benefits of Liquid Biopsy over Other Sampling Methods
Minimally invasive: Many researchers believe that liquid biopsy is a much more favorable method for treatment and detection than conventional solid tumor biopsy because it is minimally invasive and easy to reproduce.
Allows studying hard-to-reach tumors: Obtaining whole tissue samples for certain tumors, like intracellular ophthalmic malignancies, is difficult. That's where liquid biopsies come in handy and allow us to study those tumors through cancer biomarker profiles.
Less resource-intensive: If cancer has metastasized and the tumor changes temporally and spatially as a response to medication, numerous biopsies may be required to get a real-time image. As a result, liquid biopsies require significantly less time than others because it provides a complete picture with reproducible results. Therefore, liquid biopsies will cost you less.
Highly sensitive: This process is highly sensitive and covers valuable information on mutations, metabolite profiles, essential genes, epigenetic changes, and copy number alterations. Hence, liquid biopsies have revolutionized cancer research.
Importance of Biospecimen for Liquid Biopsies
Through liquid biopsies, the aim is to develop more versatile and less invasive diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers for precision therapeutic approaches. And one of the critical factors in this development is the acquisition of the correct biospecimens.
The success of liquid biopsies resides in the biospecimen quality as these specimens contain all the essential biomarkers like DNA, RNA, proteins, and cellular matter that play a crucial role in research, diagnosis, and treatment.
As technologies advance and become more sensitive, the specimens must be high quality to ensure accurate results.
Garner Bio can meet your needs with high-grade biospecimens. We prospectively collect our samples from hospitals across India. These samples are processed onsite within the hour, with no leftover specimen banking.
The Importance of Biomarkers in Cancer
Biomarkers have many different roles in cancer research. They are routinely used to assess the probability of developing a disease, distinguish between benign and malignant growths, and scan for tumor sites.
Biomarkers also assist in the prognosis of patients, predicting the chances of recurrence and tracking the body's response to the therapy.
Biomarkers for Cancer
Let's look at common biomarkers in various biosamples that aid research, diagnostics, and therapeutics.
Biomarkers in Blood
Blood biopsy has identified some well-known biomarkers, like circulating tumor DNA, circulating tumor RNA, circulating tumor cells, and exosomes. Each of these biomarkers plays a vital role in the disease's research, diagnosis, and treatment.
Blood samples also study the presence of antibodies produced in response to cancer, especially lung carcinoma. Moreover, many researchers have linked multiple plasma protein signatures to the growth and development of tumors, making it another source of research, detection, and treatment.
Leverage Garner Bio’s ongoing blood and buffy coat collections from cancer patients with a full clinical workup.
Biomarkers in Tissue Samples
Tissue samples contain valuable biomarkers which play a crucial role in research and clinical settings.
You can study the molecular profile of the tumor through a tissue sample. It helps you understand the epigenome of the tumor and see how differentially expressed genes (DEGs) might influence tumor growth and progression.
Furthermore, you can also search for the presence of distinct microRNAs (miRNAs) like miR-3917 or miR-205. They are important cancer biomarkers and help us understand the disease mechanisms better while providing insight into how we can target individual tumors using precision medicine.
Markers like miRNAs are delicate and must be carefully extracted from tissue samples. That's why the samples themselves need to be of the highest quality. Garner Bio can help you get FFPE tissue samples from their partner hospitals in India and Europe. The biospecimens are ethically sourced and meet all US research and clinical development regulations.
Biomarkers in Saliva
Some findings show that you can use saliva microbes to study lung cancer. They have strongly linked high quantities of microorganisms like Veillonella and Capnocytophaga in saliva to lung carcinoma. As a result, many researchers have used saliva as a biomarker to detect lung cancer in patients.
Leverage Garner Bio’s access to over 1000 patients weekly, to get affordable access to saliva and other peripheral biofluids.
Procuring Biospecimen
Numerous biomarkers aid in cancer studies, detection, and therapy, but deciding how you will source these specimens is critical.
Acquiring the highest quality biosamples for preclinical studies is crucial as it significantly affects how your research will turn out. Often researchers look towards large biobanks for this sourcing, but the real superheroes are small procurement firms that ensure timely and high-quality delivery.
Garner Bio can help you get a broad sample range that is ethically obtained, economical, and has efficient delivery times worldwide. Through Garner Bio, you have access to FFPE tissues and other biospecimens from outside the US. This will enable an understanding of cancer's global heterogeneity and the overall effect therapeutics will have across different ethnographic groups.
Future Perspectives
Several studies show and predict how pivotal liquid biopsies have been in identifying and developing particular biomarkers. These biomarkers can be used for clinical research, detection, and treatment of fatal illnesses like cancer as they offer a minimally invasive, cost-effective solution compared to traditional solid tumor biopsies.
The standardization and further research on these biomarkers can revolutionize the cancer treatment landscape.
We can't ignore the need to develop holistic biomarkers for cancer treatment. Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have shown that many different SNPs can determine disease progression for different people. And some SNPs are more common in certain ethnicities. Thus, adding a genetic mix of samples from different populations to your preclinical studies is important.
At Garner Bio, we help you acquire biospecimens from Indian hospitals so that you can see how cancer progresses in South Asian genomes.
Depending on your requirements, we offer bespoke samples and ship them worldwide. Our partners are top Indian hospitals that guarantee high-quality specimens, quick delivery, and economical rates.
Contact us today to see how we can help you accelerate your research and take away the pain of having to worry about procuring high-grade samples!
References :
Michela B. (2021). Liquid Biopsy: A Family of Possible Diagnostic Tools. Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland), 11(8), 1391. https://doi.org/10.3390/diagnostics11081391
Calabrese, F., Lunardi, F., Pezzuto, F., Fortarezza, F., Vuljan, S. E., Marquette, C., & Hofman, P. (2019). Are There New Biomarkers in Tissue and Liquid Biopsies for the Early Detection of Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer?. Journal of clinical medicine, 8(3), 414. https://doi.org/10.3390/jcm8030414
Lone, S. N., Nisar, S., Masoodi, T., Singh, M., Rizwan, A., Hashem, S., El-Rifai, W., Bedognetti, D., Batra, S. K., Haris, M., Bhat, A. A., & Macha, M. A. (2022). Liquid biopsy: a step closer to transform diagnosis, prognosis and future of cancer treatments. Molecular cancer, 21(1), 79. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12943-022-01543-7
He, J., Xi, N., Han, Z., Luo, W., Shen, J., Wang, S., Li, J., Guo, Z., & Cheng, H. (2022). The Role of Liquid Biopsy Analytes in Diagnosis, Treatment and Prognosis of Colorectal Cancer. Frontiers in endocrinology, 13, 875442. https://doi.org/10.3389/fendo.2022.875442
Yee N. S. (2020). Liquid Biopsy: A Biomarker-Driven Tool towards Precision Oncology. Journal of clinical medicine, 9(8), 2556. https://doi.org/10.3390/jcm9082556
Soda, N., Clack, K., & Shiddiky, M. J. (2022). Recent advances in liquid biopsy technologies for cancer biomarker detection. Sensors & Diagnostics. https://doi.org/10.1039/D2SD00010E
