Molecular markers of circulating melanoma cells

Circulating Melanoma Cells

Molecular Markers of Tumor Progression in Melanoma

Malignant melanoma represents one of the most aggressive malignancies but outcome is highly variable with early tumor lesions having an excellent prognosis following resection. We review here the data on identification of genes involved in the progression of melanoma as a result of expression array studies, genomic profiling, and genetic models. We focus on the role of tumor suppressors involve...

Changes in the presence of multiple markers of circulating melanoma cells correlate with clinical outcome in patients with melanoma.

PURPOSE Melanoma cells can be found in the circulation of patients with melanoma. The following study was conducted to examine whether changes in their presence could provide an early marker of response to therapy. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN We measured the presence of several markers of melanoma cells in the peripheral blood of 118 patients with resected stage IIb, III, or IV melanoma before and af...

Circulating melanoma cells and survival in metastatic melanoma.

A validated assay for the enumeration of circulating melanoma cells (CMCs) may facilitate the development of more effective therapies for metastatic melanoma patients. In this study CD146+ cells were immunomagnetically enriched from 7.5 ml of blood. Isolated cells were fluorescently stained with DAPI, anti-molecular weight melanoma-associated antigen (HMW-MAA), anti-CD45 and CD34 and Ki67. CMCs...

Circulating Melanoma Cells: Scoping the Target

CirCulating MelanoMa Cells Molecular markers have been increasingly applied in cancer to assess metastatic risk and to guide treatment, including in melanoma, where assessment of BRAF mutations in tumor tissues to determine suitability for treatment with vemurafenib is now routine (1). Static assessment of tumor tissues, however, does not indicate whether tumor cells are being shed or whether t...