Evaluation of Methylation Biomarkers for Detection of Circulating Tumor DNA and Application to Colorectal Cancer.

ABSTRACT: Solid tumors shed DNA into circulation, and there is growing evidence that the detection of circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) has broad clinical utility, including monitoring of disease, prognosis, response to chemotherapy and tracking tumor heterogeneity. The appearance of ctDNA in the circulating cell-free DNA (ccfDNA) isolated from plasma or serum is commonly detected by identifying tumor-specific features such as insertions, deletions, mutations and/or aberrant methylation. Methylation is a normal cell regulatory event, and since the majority of ccfDNA is derived from white blood cells (WBC), it is important that tumour-specific DNA methylation markers show rare to no methylation events in WBC DNA. We have used a novel approach for assessment of low levels of DNA methylation in WBC DNA. DN

SUBMITTER: Mitchell SM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5192501 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature