Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News Reports On Cancer Biomarkers

Main Category: Medical Devices / Diagnostics
Also Included In: Cancer / Oncology;  Biology / Biochemistry
Article Date: 02 Apr 2008 - 4:00 PDT

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Biotechnology companies are focusing on the development of novel biomarkers to overcome the limitations of current diagnostic tests for cancer, reports Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News (GEN). To effectively move cancer therapy forward, a much stronger and targeted emphasis on diagnosis will be required, according to an article in the April 1 issue of GEN (http://www.genengnews.com/articles/chitem.aspx?aid=2428).

"Therapeutic protocols can involve hundreds of thousands of dollars per cancer patient," notes John Sterling, Editor-in-Chief of GEN (http://www.genengnews.com/). "Coming up with effective and validated biomarkers that detect cancer while still in its early stages seems like an extremely worthwhile effort on which to spend R&D funds now to cut down on costs of treatment in the future."

A team led by Edouard Nice, Ph.D., at the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, is one example of a group hard at work trying to develop early detection tools for malignancies. Dr. Nice and his colleagues are using multidimensional high-performance liquid chromatography to trace enrich low-level components such as growth factors in tumor material prior to analysis by mass spectrometry.

At Wayne State University School of Medicine, a research program run by Michael Tainsky, Ph.D., harnesses antibodies in patients' serum for the detection of cancer-specific epitopes using peptides selected for IgG binding from phage-display cDNA libraries.

Other biomarker-related projects covered in the GEN article include those at Sienna Cancer Diagnostics, Geron, Quest Diagnostics Nichols Institute, Gentel Biosciences, Celera, University of Washington, Abbott Laboratories, Strategic Diagnostics, Plasma Proteome Institute, and Biosite.

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Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News, which is published 21 times a year by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., is the most widely read biotechnology news magazine worldwide. It includes articles on Drug Discovery, Bioprocessing, OMICS, Biobusiness, and Clinical Research and Diagnostics.

Source: Vicki Cohn
Mary Ann Liebert, Inc./Genetic Engineering News

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