In the United States, breast, lung/bronchus, prostate, colorectal, and melanoma of the skin are the most common cancer types.1 In early stages, these solid tumor cancers pose great diagnostic challenges to clinicians. While early detection is correlated with improved prognoses, it can be difficult to diagnose due to a lack of noticeable symptoms and low concentrations of critical cancer biomarkers.
Exosomes, once thought to be waste vehicles, have now been identified as abundant molecular messengers capable of being manipulated by pathogens and malignant cancers to facilitate tumor growth.2 Cancerous cells have altered exosomal expression patterns for stimulating tumor progression, providing health care providers with a source to obtain tumor genetic insights.3,4 As a result, circulating exosomes have been identified as a cancer biomarker with the potential identify tumor heterogeneity and inform cancer prognosis.5 Health care providers can distinguish unique tumor types, activity, and progression using exosomal RNA which has been shown to have genetically distinct expression patterns in cancer patients.
Liquid biopsy allows for a greater amount of RNA exosomes to be extracted than a traditional tissue biopsy, resulting in earlier cancer detection and identification of cancer-driving mutations for targeted therapeutic treatments. The nRichDX Revolution System is expanding the capabilities of liquid biopsy with higher yield inputs than competing sample prep systems for increased exosomal RNA yield and tumor diagnostic accuracy.
