**Introduction**

**Chapter 1**

**Provisional chapter**

**Introductory Chapter: Liquid Biopsy — A Promising**

**Introductory Chapter: Liquid Biopsy — A Promising** 

Liquid biopsy represents a spectrum of technologies for the molecular analysis of blood and other biological liquids (e.g. urine, saliva or others) in order to detect cell-free/ tumour nucleic acids, exosomes, microRNAs, tumour-educated platelets and circulating or free-floating tumour or foetal cells, depending on the clinical context. In contrast to classic tumour markers, e.g. prostate-specific antigen (PSA) or carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA), liquid biopsy is distinguished by high specificity as it provides genomic, proteomic and cellular characteristics of the disease. The anticipated outstanding reliability of these tests has been reflected in the term itself: "liquid biopsy" is expected to be at least as informative as tissue biopsy, used as the gold standard in certain diagnostic fields,

The advantages of liquid biopsy include non-invasive approach which is patient-friendly, associated with remarkably low possibility of complications and technically feasible even in patients who are in serious general status or affected by tumour or metastases that are not easily accessible by conventional tissue biopsy. The clinically simple application allows the repeated use of liquid biopsy resulting in real-time follow-up for the disease course. The testing is fast and exact as definite molecular markers are sought for. Generally, liquid biopsy is a much awaited tool to overcome the limitations set by tumour heterogeneity upon conventional tissue biopsy representing only a small part of the whole tumour [1]. However, some technological modifications of liquid biopsy in certain patients can be subjected to the same restrictions regarding heterogeneity. A characteristic example would be the assessment of circulating tumour cells (CTCs) in patients with low burden of malignant cells in the blood. For instance, the diagnostic threshold of

> © 2016 The Author(s). Licensee InTech. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use,

distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

DOI: 10.5772/intechopen.86918

**Technology of the Future**

**Technology of the Future**

Ilze Strumfa and Janis Gardovskis

Ilze Strumfa and Janis Gardovskis

http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86918

**1. Introduction**

especially in oncology.

Additional information is available at the end of the chapter

Additional information is available at the end of the chapter

#### **Introductory Chapter: Liquid Biopsy — A Promising Technology of the Future Introductory Chapter: Liquid Biopsy — A Promising Technology of the Future**

DOI: 10.5772/intechopen.86918

Ilze Strumfa and Janis Gardovskis Ilze Strumfa and Janis Gardovskis

Additional information is available at the end of the chapter Additional information is available at the end of the chapter

http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86918
