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Review
. 2012 Dec;6(6):704-15.
doi: 10.1016/j.molonc.2012.07.005. Epub 2012 Aug 16.

Detection of cancer-specific epigenomic changes in biofluids: powerful tools in biomarker discovery and application

André Nogueira da Costa  1 , Zdenko Herceg
Affiliations
Review

Detection of cancer-specific epigenomic changes in biofluids: powerful tools in biomarker discovery and application

André Nogueira da Costa et al. Mol Oncol. 2012 Dec.

Abstract

The genetic and epigenetic material originating from tumour that can be found in body fluids of individuals with cancer harbours tumour-specific alterations and represents an attractive target for biomarker discovery. Epigenetic changes (DNA methylation, histone modifications and non-coding RNAs) are present ubiquitously in virtually all types of human malignancies and may appear in early cancer development, and thus they provide particularly attractive markers with broad applications in diagnostics. In addition, because changes in the epigenome may constitute a signature of specific exposure to certain risk factors, they have the potential to serve as highly specific biomarkers for risk assessment. While reliable detection of cancer-specific epigenetic changes has proven to be technically challenging, a substantial progress has been made in developing the methodologies that allow an efficient and sensitive detection of epigenomic changes using the material originating from body fluids. In this review we discuss the application of epigenomics as a tool for biomarker research, with the focus on the analysis of DNA methylation in biofluids.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Development of DNA methylation‐based early cancer detection biomarkers, amidst environmental and dietary exposures.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Schematic of methodologies applied to epigenomics.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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