Diagnosis of colorectal cancer using cfDNA by specific methylation marker

2021 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 19K16868
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Early-Career Scientists
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Review Section: Basic Section 50020:Tumor diagnostics and therapeutics-related
• Research Institution: Nagoya University
• Principal Investigator: SHIMIZU Dai 名古屋大学, 医学部附属病院, 助教 (50723037)
• Project Period (FY): 2019-04-01 – 2022-03-31
• Keywords: 大腸癌 / メチル化 / cfDNA

Outline of Final Research Achievements

We established the CAncer Cell-of-Origin (CACO) methylation panel using the methylation data of the 28 types of cancer in The Cancer Genome Atlas (7950 patients and 707 normal controls) as well as healthy whole blood samples (95 subjects). We showed that the CACO methylation panel had high diagnostic potential with high sensitivity and specificity in the discovery (maximum AUC = 0.998) and validation (maximum AUC = 1.000) cohorts. Moreover, we confirmed that the CACO methylation panel could identify the cancer cell type of origin using the methylation profile from liquid as well as tissue biopsy, including primary, metastatic, and multiregional cancer samples and cancer of unknown primary, independent of the methylation analysis platform and specimen preparation method. Together, the CACO methylation panel can be a powerful tool for the classification and diagnosis of cancer.

Free Research Field

消化器外科学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

本研究の結果を発展させることにより、１回の採血や尿検査などのリキッドバイオプシー検査を用いることで、最大27種類の悪性腫瘍の存在を的確に識別可能な検診技術への発展が期待される。単回検査で多癌種の診断が可能となれば、受診負担軽減から検診受診率が向上し、健康予後の改善が期待できる。また、原発不明癌の正確な原発巣診断に活用できる可能性があり、原発不明癌に対してより客観的な原発巣診断ツールとして用いることができ、より適した治療を提供できる可能性が示唆された。