Circulating Biomarkers In Prostate Cancer

In the era of precision oncology, liquid biopsy techniques, specifically the use of circulating tumor cells (CTCs), cell free circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) and extracellular vesicles particularly exosomes, represent a paradigm shift in the conventional use of tissue based biomarkers. Compared to tissue biopsy, liquid biopsy is cost-effective, readily accessible and less invasive, minimizing the bias of sampling and offering the opportunity for serial monitoring. Circulating biomarkers detected in liquid biopsy (blood and urine, etc.) are helping in understanding cancer genomic landscape and evolution, thus have been largely studied in term of cancer screening, risk stratification and early detection of minimal residual disease.

Castration-resistant prostate cancers (CRPCs) are the late stage of prostate cancers. With significant progress towards the treatment of CRPCs, for example, androgen receptor-signalling (ARS) targeted therapy and immunotherapy, there is an urgent need to identify novel biomarkers to improve the survival rate and prognosis of CRPCs. The study of such biomarkers associated signal pathways and immune status has become a major focus in research to help understanding the responses to drug resistance and ineffective treatments. The discovery of these biomarkers in selecting potentially responsive patients will improve outcomes, and reduce treatment costs and, most importantly, significantly improve patient’s quality of life.

This Research Topic aims to explore recent advance in identification of circulating biomarkers in helping clinical management of prostate cancers.

Topics of interest include:
-Circulating biomarkers (circulating tumor cells, cell-free DNA, exosomes) identified in prostate cancers.

-Emerging circulating molecular biomarkers with significant prognostic and predictive values in clinical management, and their Impact in the prostate cancer prognosis and epidemiology.

-Identification of novel biomarkers associated with immune status and drug resistance of prostate cancer, specially CRPCs.

-Emerging molecular technologies for circulating biomarkers.

We welcome the submission of Original Research, Review (including systematic review and meta-analysis) and Mini-Reviews.

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.