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Review
. 2018 Mar 1;8(3):332-353.
eCollection 2018.

Circulating biomarkers for early diagnosis of pancreatic cancer: facts and hopes

Xu Zhang  1   2 , Si Shi  1   2   3   4 , Bo Zhang  1   2   3   4 , Quanxing Ni  1   2   3   4 , Xianjun Yu  1   2   3   4 , Jin Xu  1   2   3   4
Affiliations
Review

Circulating biomarkers for early diagnosis of pancreatic cancer: facts and hopes

Xu Zhang et al. Am J Cancer Res. .

Abstract

Pancreatic cancer (PC) is characterized by extremely high mortality and poor prognosis, which are largely ascribed to difficulties in early diagnosis and limited therapeutics. Although there is a sufficient window for intervention before preneoplastic lesions progress to invasive disease, effective early detection of PC remains difficult using current biomarkers and imaging techniques. Biomarkers with satisfactory diagnostic efficacy and convenient analysis methods are urgently required. In this review, we summarized recent advances in the identification of biomarkers in circulation for early detection of PC. A number of novel circulating biomarkers, such as metabolites, cell-free DNA (cfDNA), noncoding RNA, and exosomes, that show promising diagnostic value have been discovered using advances in sequencing techniques and "omics" analyses. Panels comprising several biomarkers may also exhibit better diagnostic performance. In the future, we need more efficient circulating biomarkers for the identification of noninvasive precursor lesions and early disease. Collaborative large-scale studies are also required to show the clinical validity and applicability of potential biomarkers.

Keywords: Pancreatic cancer; circulating biomarkers; early diagnosis.

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Conflict of interest statement

None.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Overview of major circulating biomarkers for early detection of pancreatic cancer. Various biomarkers can be detected in plasma or serum from PC patients.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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