About this Research Topic
Still, in addition to guiding treatment decisions, CTC monitoring can also help in the early detection and monitoring of metastasis, which is often a major challenge in cancer management, and provide valuable insights into the genetic mutations, gene expression profiles, and biomarkers expressed by tumor cells, information that can help identify specific targets for targeted therapies, predict response to certain treatments, and guide the selection of personalized treatment options for patients. Recently, CTCs have emerged as a promising target for drug development in the field of oncology. CTCs have been shown to contribute to drug development by providing a unique opportunity to study the genetic mutations, gene expression patterns, and biomarkers expressed by tumor cells in real-time. Analyzing CTCs can help identify specific molecular targets that can be exploited for understanding drug resistance mechanisms and drug development. By understanding the biology of CTCs, researchers can develop drugs that specifically target and eliminate these cells in a personalized approach, preventing metastasis and improving patient outcomes.
The aim of this Research Topic is to address the clinical relevance of CTCs through the application of emerging methods for characterizing CTCs that have not been currently incorporated into clinical practices outside of clinical trials.
We welcome papers focused on CTCs recognition methods based on deep learning, as well as on emerging tools to investigate the genome, transcriptome, proteome, and secretome of CTCs as biomarkers to guide precision oncology treatments are particularly of interest, including applications for:
1. Biomarker discovery
2. Treatment guidance
3. Drug resistance mechanisms
4. Personalized medicine
5. New drug targets
6. Assessment of drug efficacy
Please note: manuscripts consisting solely of bioinformatics or computational analysis of public genomic or transcriptomic databases which are not accompanied by validation (independent cohort or biological validation in vitro or in vivo) are out of scope for this section and will not be accepted as part of this Research Topic.
Keywords: Circulating tumor cells, Clinical validation, Clinical utility, Precision oncology, Drug discovery
Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.