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Review
. 2021 Oct 29;13(21):5429.
doi: 10.3390/cancers13215429.

Liquid Biopsy and Primary Brain Tumors

Robert H Eibl  1 , Markus Schneemann  2
Affiliations
Review

Liquid Biopsy and Primary Brain Tumors

Robert H Eibl et al. Cancers (Basel). .

Abstract

Two decades of "promising results" in liquid biopsy have led to both continuing disappointment and hope that the new era of minimally invasive, personalized analysis can be applied for better diagnosis, prognosis, monitoring, and therapy of cancer. Here, we briefly highlight the promises, developments, and challenges related to liquid biopsy of brain tumors, including circulating tumor cells, cell-free nucleic acids, extracellular vesicles, and miRNA; we further discuss the urgent need to establish suitable biomarkers and the right standards to improve modern clinical management of brain tumor patients with the use of liquid biopsy.

Keywords: biomarker; brain tumor; circulating tumor (ct)DNA; circulating tumor cell—CTC; extracellular vesicle; glioblastoma; glioma; liquid biopsy; medulloblastoma; microRNA—miR.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Liquid biopsy. Distant from the original brain tumor, samples from blood and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) can typically serve as a low-risk source of tumor-derived nucleic acids (RNA, DNA) for further analysis. CSF—cerebrospinal fluid; EV—extracellular vesicle; CTC—circulating tumor cell. Created/modified with https://smart.servier.com (accessed on 8 August 2021), licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ (accessed on 8 August 2021)).
Figure 2
Figure 2
Hypothetical biomarker during brain tumor development, therapy, and monitoring. A growing tumor causes elevated levels of a biomarker at time of diagnostic imaging; the levels drop significantly after surgical removal of the tumor and stay low during additional radio- and chemotherapy. Liquid biopsy allows minimally invasive, real-time monitoring in order to differentiate progression from pseudoprogression of the tumor.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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