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Review
. 2020 May 27;39(1):95.
doi: 10.1186/s13046-020-01601-2.

Liquid biopsy and tumor heterogeneity in metastatic solid tumors: the potentiality of blood samples

Marco Russano  1 , Andrea Napolitano  1 , Giulia Ribelli  2 , Michele Iuliani  1 , Sonia Simonetti  1 , Fabrizio Citarella  1 , Francesco Pantano  1 , Emanuela Dell'Aquila  1 , Cecilia Anesi  1 , Nicola Silvestris  3   4 , Antonella Argentiero  3 , Antonio Giovanni Solimando  3   5 , Bruno Vincenzi  1 , Giuseppe Tonini  1 , Daniele Santini  1
Affiliations
Review

Liquid biopsy and tumor heterogeneity in metastatic solid tumors: the potentiality of blood samples

Marco Russano et al. J Exp Clin Cancer Res. .

Erratum in

Abstract

In a large number of cancer types, treatment selection depends on the presence of specific tumor biomarkers. Due to the dynamic nature of cancer, very often these predictive biomarkers are not uniformly present in all cancer cells. Tumor heterogeneity represents indeed one of the main causes of therapeutic failure, and its decoding remains a major ongoing challenge in the field.Liquid biopsy is the sampling and analysis of non-solid biological tissue often through rapid and non-invasive methods, which allows the assessment in real-time of the evolving landscape of cancer. Samples can be obtained from blood and most other bodily fluids. A blood-based liquid biopsy can capture circulating tumor cells and leukocytes, as well as circulating tumor-derived nucleic acids.In this review, we discuss the current and possibly future applications of blood-based liquid biopsy in oncology, its advantages and its limitations in clinical practice. We specifically focused on its role as a tool to capture tumor heterogeneity in metastatic cancer patients.

Keywords: Circulating tumor DNA; Circulating tumor cells; Liquid biopsy; Peripheral blood mononuclear cells; Tumor heterogeneity; microRNA.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Liquid biopsy, non invasive and low-risk procedure, allows to monitor the changing and evolving landscape of cancer in real-time during the course of disease. In blood vessels, circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA), circulating tumor RNA (ctRNA), non-coding RNAs, circulating tumor cells (CTCs), and circulating leukocytes represent promising biomarkers to assess tumor heterogeneity and patients’ treatment response
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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