Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2020 Feb 28:13:2516865720904052.
doi: 10.1177/2516865720904052. eCollection 2020.

Liquid Biopsy: The Unique Test for Chasing the Genetics of Solid Tumors

Seyed Mohammad Kazem Aghamir  1 , Ramin Heshmat  2 , Mehdi Ebrahimi  3 , Fatemeh Khatami  1
Affiliations
Review

Liquid Biopsy: The Unique Test for Chasing the Genetics of Solid Tumors

Seyed Mohammad Kazem Aghamir et al. Epigenet Insights. .

Abstract

Blood test is a kind of liquid biopsy that checks cancer cells or cancer nucleic acids circulating freely from cells in the blood. A liquid biopsy may be used to distinguish cancer at early stages and it could be a game-changer for both cancer diagnosis and prognosis strategies. Liquid biopsy tests consider several tumor components, such as DNA, RNA, proteins, and the tiny vesicles originating from tumor cells. Actually, liquid biopsy signifies the genetic alterations of tumors through nucleic acids or cells in various body fluids, including blood, urine, cerebrospinal fluid, or saliva in a noninvasive manner. In this review, we present an overall description of liquid biopsy in which circulating tumor cells, cell-free nucleic acids, exosomes, and extrachromosomal circular DNA are included.

Keywords: Liquid biopsy; cell-free nucleic acids (cfNAs); circulating tumor cells (CTCs); exosomes.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Declaration Of Conflicting Interests:The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Schematic figure of the liquid biopsy and the way that its genetic components are presented in the blood.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Siegel RL, Miller KD, Jemal A. Cancer statistics, 2018. CA Cancer J Clin. 2018;68:7-30. - PubMed
    1. Ashworth T. A case of cancer in which cells similar to those in the tumours were seen in the blood after death. Med J Australia. 1869;14:146-147.
    1. Mandel P. Les acides nucleiques du plasma sanguin chez l’homme. C R Seances Soc Biol Fil. 1948;142:241-243. - PubMed
    1. Leon S, Shapiro B, Sklaroff D, Yaros M. Free DNA in the serum of cancer patients and the effect of therapy. Cancer Res. 1977;37:646-650. - PubMed
    1. Kidess E, Jeffrey SS. Circulating tumor cells versus tumor-derived cell-free DNA: rivals or partners in cancer care in the era of single-cell analysis? Genome Med. 2013;5:70. - PMC - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources