Simultaneous cell isolation technology shows clinical feasibility for increased accuracy in cancer diagnostics

Researchers ushered in a brand new chapter for customized and exact cancer diagnostics utilizing technology that may mechanically and concurrently isolate circulating tumor cells (CTC) and circulating cancer-associated fibroblasts (cCAF) from blood.

The analysis group in contrast three FDA-approved automated CTC isolation programs (marker-based, size-based, and hemocyte extraction–based mostly) based mostly on the identical affected person blood, and confirmed the world-leading efficiency of the CTCeptor technology, which was initially developed and owned by DGIST and commercialized by CTCELLS.

More particularly, CTCeptor has acquired quite a lot of consideration, because it has confirmed to not solely seize tumor cells of varied sizes and markers with high efficiency but in addition isolate cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs), which play a essential function in the tumor microenvironment (TME).

The findings are published in the journal Analytical Chemistry. The research was a research collaboration with the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE) and CTCELLS, a analysis group led by Professor Minseok Kim on the Department of New Biology, the Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science & Technology.

Upon analyzing blood from early-stage breast cancer sufferers, the analysis group discovered that CTCeptor (hemocyte extraction–based mostly) detected a minimum of 15 instances extra CTCs than current applied sciences, specifically, CellSearch (marker-based) and Parsortix (size-based).

In the identical samples, CTCeptor detected cCAFs at a mean frequency of about 10 instances greater than CTCs and demonstrated for the primary time the heterogeneity of CAF markers in blood-derived cells. The findings recommend that CTCeptor can enhance the sensitivity and precision of liquid biopsy and significantly improve the accuracy of early prognosis and remedy response monitoring.

In additional experiments utilizing totally different cancer cell traces, together with breast, lung, and ovarian, and a breast cancer CTC-derived cell line, the analysis group confirmed that CTCeptor has a secure and excessive restoration price, whatever the cell measurement (13–17 μm) and EpCAM expression degree. Meanwhile, the size-based filter technology has confirmed limitations that may lower seize effectivity relying on cell deformability.

“Although liquid biopsy technology has focused on obtaining cancer information from blood for the past 25 years, this study holds significance, as it serves as the basis for identifying not only cancer but also key information about the tumor microenvironment,” stated Professor Minseok Kim.

“Our technology can simultaneously analyze tumor cells and microenvironment cells with a single blood sample, which will greatly contribute to increasing the success rate of new drug development and establishing personalized treatment strategies.”