Themed collection Innovative Tools for Cancer Screening, Detection and Diagnostics

Welcome to this Analyst themed issue on Innovative Tools for Cancer Screening, Detection and Diagnostics, guest edited by Steven A. Soper and Avraham Rasooly.

This paper will review the analytical strategies used to assess oncogenic mutations from biofluid samples. Clinical applications will also be discussed.

Aptamers as specific and sensitive probes for in vitro diagnosis of cancer cells, immunohistochemical (IHC) staining of tumor tissues, and in vivo imaging detection of tumors.

Review of different biosensors and nanobiosensors increasingly used in therapeutic drug monitoring (TDM) for pharmaceutical drugs with dosage limitations or toxicity issues and for therapeutic response monitoring.

A liquid biopsy is more practical for real-time monitoring of disease progression than tissue biopsy.

We present an overview of current isolation, detection, and characterization methods of extracellular vesicles and their applications and limitations as a potential emerging biomarker in cancer management and their clinical implementation.

Instrumental advances in infrared micro-spectroscopy have made possible the observation of individual human cells and even subcellular structures.

RNA binding proteins (RBP) regulate the editing, localization, stabilization, translation, and degradation of ribonucleic acids (RNA) through their interactions with specific cis-acting elements within target RNAs.

Among the growing number of tools available for cancer studies, microfluidic systems have emerged as a promising analytical tool to elucidate cancer cell and tumor function.

Aptamers, as chemical antibodies, show great promise and power for cancer biomarker discovery and biomarker-based clinical applications.

This review explores Raman technologies with a particular emphasis on their utility for cancer diagnostic applications.

This review takes a fresh approach from the patient perspective; offering insight into the applications of midinfrared biomedical spectroscopy.

Early detection and reliable diagnostics are keys to effectively design cancer therapies with better prognoses.

We explore emerging micro and nano-technology that isolates and detects exosomes and microvesicles in clinical samples for cancer diagnostics.

Cancer is currently one of the top non-communicable human diseases, and continual research and developmental efforts, particularly in microfluidics technology, are being made to better understand and manage this disease.

We found that the fibrin-immobilized surfaces on microchannels were able to capture both epithelial and mesenchymal tumor cells.

An electrochemical-TUNEL method based on the fabrication of a CNT@PDA–FA three dimensional bio-interface was developed for cytosensors. By being coupled with a QD-based nanoprobe and electrochemical analysis, the sensor exhibited attractive performance in the detection of apoptotic cells.

Nanoparticles of gadolinium-incorporated Prussian blue show potential as a cellular T₁-weighted oral MRI probe for imaging the gastrointestinal tract.

Wavenumber selection based analysis with variably-sized windows was proposed, which improves skin cancer diagnostic specificity at high sensitivity levels.

Infrared imaging was applied to investigate a reconstituted basement membrane, known as Matrigel, in three-dimensional cell cultures.

Evaluation of a novel microfluidic device for epitope-independent enrichment of circulating tumour cells using clinical samples from patients with SCLC.

In recent years, significant progress has been made into the label-free detection and discrimination of individual cancer cells using Laser Tweezers Raman Spectroscopy (LTRS).

A high-throughput strategy capable of differentiating bladder cancer cells from non-cancerous cells based on their respective cellular traction forces.

An easy to assemble paper-based invasion assay to study chemotaxis of breast cancer cells in gradients of oxygen in real-time.

Comparison of spectral-histopathological features of a colon tissue measured using a conventional (5.5 μm × 5.5 μm, left) and a high-magnification (1.1 μm × 1.1 μm, right) FTIR imaging system with respect to HE stained tissue (middle).

Grating couple surface plasmon resonance (GCSPR) microarrays can be used to analyze proteins and circulating tumor cells in mice.

FTIR imaging allows automated identification and quantification of breast tumor cells as well as investigating tumor-related stroma alterations.

Microfluidic assay for the selection of circulating leukemic cells from peripheral blood for the early detection of minimal residual disease in acute myeloid leukemia patients.

Monitoring activity of single cells has high significance for basic science and diagnostic applications.

Abnormal DNA methylation patterns caused by altered DNA methyltransferase (MTase) activity are closely associated with cancer. Herein, using DNA adenine methylation methyltransferase (Dam MTase) as a model analyte, we designed an allosteric molecular beacon (aMB) for sensitive detection of Dam MTase activity.

A shortened portable degron based on a MDM2/p53 binding region that was capable of ubiquitination in cytosolic lysates was isolated as a new substrate for analytical detection of E3 ligase or proteasome activity.

IR-MALDESI polarity switching mass spectrometry imaging reveals differences in lipid distribution in hen ovarian cancer tissue.

Sensing of methotrexate at clinically-relevant concentrations was achieved with a plasmon-coupling assay.

Spectrochemical discrimination of ovarian cancer.