Publications by authors named "D Stergiopoulou"
Article Synopsis
- The study presents a new liquid bead array assay that detects specific mutations in circulating tumor cells (CTCs) from metastatic breast cancer (MBC) patients, which can help identify tumor progression and therapy resistance.
- The assay utilizes advanced techniques like enzymatic mutation enrichment and multiplex PCR, allowing for highly sensitive (0.1% mutation detection limit) and specific identification of mutations in single CTCs.
- Validation of the assay showed that it can analyze 96 single cells at once, making it both efficient and sample-conserving, thereby providing crucial insights into the genetic landscape of tumors.
Breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related deaths in women worldwide. Approximately 40% of patients with hormone receptor-positive, human epidermal growth factor receptor-2-negative breast cancer have activating mutations in the gene. We developed a highly sensitive, specific, cost-effective, and reproducible dual-drop-off droplet digital polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay for the simultaneous detection of ten hotspots of mutations in plasma cell-free (cf) DNA.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose: We assessed whether preoperativemutational analyses of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) and plasma-cfDNA could be used as minimally invasive biomarkers and as complimentary tools for early prediction of relapse in early-stage non-small -cell lung cancer (NSCLC).
Experimental Design: Using ddPCR assays, hotspot mutations of and were identified in plasma-cfDNA samples and size-based enriched CTCs isolated from the same blood samples of 49 early-stage NSCLC patients before surgery and in a control group of healthy blood donors (= 22). Direct concordance of the mutational spectrum was further evaluated in 27 patient-matched plasma-cfDNA and CTC-derived DNA in comparison to tissue-derived DNA.
Liquid biopsy (LB) provides a unique minimally invasive tool to follow-up cancer patients over time, to detect minimal residual disease (MRD), to study metastasis-biology and mechanisms of therapy-resistance. Molecular characterization of CTCs offers additionally the potential to understand resistance to therapy and implement individualized targeted treatments which can be modified during the disease evolution and follow-up period of a patient. In this study, we present a long-term follow-up of operable breast cancer patients based on a comprehensive liquid biopsy analysis.
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- * This study aimed to assess the frequency and importance of mutations in high-grade serous ovarian cancer (HGSOC) using droplet digital PCR (ddPCR) on tumor samples and plasma cfDNA from patients.
- * Findings revealed mutations in 15% of tumor samples and 13.8% of plasma cfDNA, marking a significant discovery in ovarian cancer research, but further validation in larger patient cohorts is necessary.