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Tracking tumor resistance using 'liquid biopsies'

Nature Medicine volume 19, pages 676–677 (2013)Cite this article

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Klaus Pantel

Metastases evolve many years after primary tumor resection and can harbor unique genomic alterations. The direct analysis of metastatic cells will therefore reveal important information for systemic cancer therapy. However, repeat biopsies of overt metastases require difficult invasive procedures that are not easily acceptable in the clinic, and interpretation of analyses of repeat biopsies is confounded by the marked intrapatient heterogeneity of different metastases. An alternative approach is the analysis of ctDNA present in blood plasma of patients with cancer2. The peripheral blood contains cells and/or DNA derived from different metastatic sites and may therefore provide a more comprehensive picture than the analysis of a single metastatic lesion.

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Competing interests

L.D. is a cofounder of Personal Genome Diagnostics and Inostics, is a member of their scientific advisory boards and owns stock in both companies, which is subject to certain restrictions under Johns Hopkins University policy. The other authors declare no conflict of interest.

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Tracking tumor resistance using 'liquid biopsies'. Nat Med 19, 676–677 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/nm.3233

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