Development of a Diagnostic Blood Test for Breast Cancer
Abstract
The purpose of this project is to develop and test the feasibility of a diagnostic blood test for breast cancer. Specifically, we are testing the feasibility of detecting breast cancer DNA shed into plasma (or serum) using methylation-specific PCR. In our studies to date, we have shown that large breast cancers shed sufficient quantities of DNA to allow detection using our proposed strategy. We have encountered several unexpected challenges to our expected application of this strategy for clinical application, however. First, many breast cancers do not have methylation of genes that we originally proposed for testing. We have successfully identified other genes that are frequently methylated in breast cancers, however, and will proceed in our project using these markers. A second problem that we have encountered is that the small serum or plasma sample size available does not frequently allow us to test multiple markers as proposed. We are addressing this problem by using a nested PCR approach that will allow us to test multiple markers from a single small sample. Additional ongoing studies will determine the limits of sensitivity for our assay in terms of tumor size and sample volume required.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Sep 01, 2001
- Accession Number
- ADA403321
Entities
People
- Edward W. Gabrielson
Organizations
- Johns Hopkins University