DIFFERENT LEVELS IN BLOOD CELL SAMPLES OF EMT-MARKERS FOR THE DIAGNOSIS OF CANCER, IN PARTICULAR OF COLORECTAL (CRC) AND PANCREATIC (PC) CANCER

摘要

The present invention concerns a method for determining if a subject is affected by a colorectal or pancreatic cancer or for determining the stage and/or the progression of a colorectal cancer. By measuring the presence of a panel of m RNAs encoding for transcription factors/genes involved in epithelial to mesenchymal transition in a blood sample, wherein different mRNA levels of a set of genes comprising TWIST1, SLUG, ZEB2, ZEB1 and CDH1, are indicative of colorectal cancer or pancreatic cancer diagnosis, and/or of colorectal cancer stage at diagnosis, and/or of CRC metastatic progression after surgery. The invention concerns also the use of kits to work the method.

主权项

1. A method for determining if a subject is affected by a cancer comprising the step of assaying a blood cell sample from said subject for the presence of a panel of mRNAs comprising at least SLUG and TWIST1 mRNA wherein:
a) the increase of mRNA levels of both TWIST1 and SLUG genes but not of ZEB2 gene with respect to control samples is indicative of a colorectal cancer, b) the increase of mRNA levels of all of TWIST1, SLUG and ZEB2 genes with respect to control samples is indicative of a pancreatic cancer, c) the increase of at least SLUG mRNA level with respect to a first SLUG cut-off is indicative of colorectal or pancreatic cancer, d) in subjects wherein the SLUG mRNA level is not increased with respect to said first SLUG cut-off, the increase of TWIST1 mRNA level with respect to a TWIST1 cut-off is indicative of colorectal cancer, provided that said subject also shows an increase of SLUG mRNA with respect to a second SLUG cut off, said second SLUG cut-off being lower than the first SLUG cut off, and/or a decrease of CDH1 mRNA level with respect to a CDH1 cut-off, and e) in subjects wherein the SLUG mRNA level is not increased, the increase of TWIST1 mRNA level with respect to a TWIST1 cut-off is indicative of pancreatic cancer, provided that said subject also shows an increase of ZEB2 mRNA level.