Abstract
In order to implement the knowledge of cancer to monitor its evolution and setting, in the last decade, new minimally invasive and repeatable samples collection have been developed such as liquid biopsy. Cancer biomarkers originating from tumors can represent the molecular status of the tumor or its metastases which release them directly into body fluids or indirectly due to disruption of tumor/metastatic tissue. These biomarkers are detectable in liquid biopsy.
Recently, circulating RNAs (cfRNAs) are increasing their importance as biomarkers in liquid biopsy for cancer patients both for tumor characterization and development and for setting a monitoring personalized therapy. Circulating RNAs are represented by a broad range of subtypes, such as microRNA (miRNAs), long non coding RNA (lncRNAs), messenger RNAs (mRNAs), transfer RNAs (tRNAs), snRNAs (small nuclear RNAs), snoRNA (small nucleolar RNAs), piwiRNAs (piRNA) and circRNAs (circular RNAs). In endometrial cancer only some of these cf-RNAs have been investigated, no studies have been performed on snoRNAs, piRNAs, snRNAs and tRNA, the most analyzed one is represented by cf-miRNA in plasma. These findings open an immediate use of selected cf-miRNA as biomarker in liquid biopsy of EC and suggest further investigation of the other cf-RNAs to implement the knowledge in this fascinating field.
Keywords
Cell free RNA (cfRNA), Circular RNAs (circRNAs), Liquid biopsy, Biomarker, Endometrial cancer