[rdmirza]

I think you’re spot on about the clear advantage of your approach relative to the article and blood biopsies: If you’re looking for cancer in the blood, you’re probably too late as this suggests metastatic spread.

You suggest something better: look for tissue level markers.

The immunotherapy revolution (ie CTLA/PD1 molecules), you’ll recognize that leveraging the immune system is brilliantly effective.

Presumably stealth genes do not evolve first, but rather proliferative genes. And this is why any chronic damage triggers cancer because renewal is a replicative process, and replications begets copy errors. wanderers and passersby will have to recognize I’m simplifying.

I have a great lateral. Not sure if you have the funds to try two things, but TCR characterization is a wonderful idea. At least thats the best way to do it, as I see it. has many application beyond cancer

Good luck!

[didgeoridoo]

> If you’re looking for cancer in the blood, you’re probably too late as this suggests metastatic spread.

Isn’t the point of cfDNA that you can pick up “dead” DNA fragments floating around long before you have viable cancer cells drifting through the bloodstream and lymphatic system?

[mbreese]

Yes. Normal cells break apart all the time. If you measure total cfDNA amount in a blood sample, you'll find significantly a higher cfDNA concentration after you exercise. It's a normal part of the wear and tear of cells.

So, if you find cfDNA from a tumor, it's not necessarily indicative of metastatic spread... just that the tumor cells have been broken up. It could be from too much growth, or immune attack, or metastasis, or... etc.

cfDNA is great in that you can run a single assay to cover the entire body. cfDNA is difficult because your single assay covers the entire body. You can't localize the source of cfDNA.