CNIO is involved in Europe’s most ambitious project for the early detection of one of the deadliest types of cancer.
Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is the most common type of pancreatic cancer. deadliest tumors. The incidence among young people is growing, although the expert community does not know why. Researchers from the National Center for Cancer Research (CNIO) Nuria Malac And Hector Peinado They are leading a European project in Spain. PANCAID diagnose pancreatic cancer years before the onset of symptoms using a non-invasive method – liquid biopsy.
PANCAIDan acronym in English that stands for Initial Detection of Pancreatic Cancer by Liquid Biopsy, started a year ago and will receive €9.8 million in funding from the European Commission (EC) until 2027. It is a consortium of research centers from eight countries (Germany, Sweden, Spain, Austria, Belgium, France, Israel and the UK).
“This is one of the most ambitious studies launched to date to improve the early detection of pancreatic cancer,” he says. Hairstyle. “This is a challenge designed to completely change the current situation, in which less than 6% of cases are identified where they can be eliminated surgically. Early detection of a tumor opens up opportunities for early treatment, so we want to develop a diagnostic test that can be used in everyday clinical practice.”
There are currently no screening methods pancreatic canceran organ that, due to its position in the abdominal cavity, is not visible with conventional imaging methods. The tumor grows quickly and is usually in an advanced stage by the time symptoms appear. The average survival rate after diagnosis of metastatic pancreatic cancer that has already spread to other organs is seven months, and the vast majority of cases are diagnosed at this inoperable stage.
“This is an aggressive tumor that is increasing in the younger population and in women, which is something we haven’t seen before,” he explains. Malate. More than 8,000 cases of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) are diagnosed each year in Spain, and more than 150,000 in the entire European Union.
More sensitive analysis methods and more data
But researchers from CNIO They also highlight new biomedical techniques now available that are more sensitive and diverse. With their help, as well as with the help AI (artificial intelligence), detection capability pancreatic cancer in a simple blood test, at the very initial stages.
IN PANCAID They will look for biomarkers found in the blood that warn of the presence of a tumor, such as products derived from tumor cells, even if in minute quantities. To do this, blood samples will be collected and analyzed from patients with pancreatic cancer, its precursors and people at risk (for example, patients with a genetic predisposition).
Once possible biomarkers have been identified, artificial intelligence (AI) determine the best of them and their combinations. Once the best set of markers is found, their effectiveness will be confirmed in a multicenter clinical trial.
Molecular signature found in blood
Nuria Malats, head of the genetic and molecular epidemiology group of the CNIO, heads PANCAID a group responsible for a platform for managing, standardizing, and recovering large quantities of relevant data of a wide variety of types and sources, and for analyzing this data using classical and artificial intelligence-based approaches.
“The goal is to combine the identified biomarkers into a single signature that can be used in pancreatic cancer screening programs,” he explains. Malate. “We are going to use new machine learning strategies and neural networks.”
Héctor Peinado, head of the microenvironment and metastasis group at the CNIO, will analyze patients’ plasma to identify biomarkers secreted in extracellular vesicles (components of tumor cells that travel through the bloodstream).
Pilot study
The project is progressing according to plan. “There are two stages,” says Peinado, “on the one hand, the collection and distribution of samples to all the laboratories involved, and on the other, the optimization of methods for analyzing samples and data. A pilot study has already been conducted and analysis of serum samples has begun. Next year we will start with plasma.”
Malat’s group has already developed databases and an analysis plan using artificial intelligence, “to begin as soon as we have marker data for other groups to analyze.”
Both researchers are international leaders in their field. In addition to participating in PANCAID, Malate She is co-author of a discovery that could lead to the use of stool testing to diagnose pancreatic cancer. In 2022, he published the discovery of a molecular signature of 27 microorganisms in stool samples that could predict patients at high risk of pancreatic cancer and even detect the disease in its early stages. Based on these results, a patent application was filed to develop a pancreatic cancer diagnostic kit that detects these microbial genomes in stool samples.
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