Not all cancer biomarkers are the same: Finding useful ones is key

If proteins could talk, they would have a lot to say. Some, for example, would scream the presence of cancer.

Of course, they don’t, but researchers have spent a great deal of time trying to get them to spill their secrets in other ways. So the scientific world is excited about a new method for detecting protein biomarkers in body fluids that could help researchers more rapidly zero in on biomarkers that signal the presence of cancer.

A team of researchers that includes the Hutchinson Center’s Dr. Amanda Paulovich has demonstrated that it’s possible to screen for the strongest and most viable cancer biomarkers among thousands of biomarkers present in blood and other body fluids—a key that could open new ways to detecting cancers early at their most treatable stage.

Biomarkers are molecular indicators of many different biological processes in the body, including diseases like cancer.

"Thousands of cancer biomarkers are discovered every day, but only a handful ever makes it through clinical validation," said Dr. John Niederhuber, director of the National Cancer Institute. "This is a critical roadblock because biomarkers have the potential to allow doctors to detect cancer in the earliest stages, when treatment provides the greatest chances of survival. The key limiting factor to date in validating biomarkers for clinical use has been the lack of standardized technologies and methodologies in the biomarker discovery and validation process, and this research may solve that dilemma."