Proteomics in prostate cancer biomarker discovery.

Despite advances in molecular medicine, genomics, proteomics and translational research, prostate cancer remains the second most common cause of cancer-related mortality for men in the Western world. Clearly, early detection, targeted treatment and post-treatment monitoring are vital tools to combat this disease. Tumor markers can be useful for diagnosis and early detection of cancer, assessment of prognosis, prediction of therapeutic effect and treatment monitoring. Such tumor markers include prostate-specific antigen (prostate), cancer antigen (CA)15.3 (breast), CA125 (ovarian), CA19.9 (gastrointestinal) and serum alpha-fetoprotein (testicular cancer). However, all of these biomarkers lack sensitivity and specificity and, therefore, there is a large drive towards proteomic biomarker discovery. Current research efforts are directed towards discovering biosignatures from biological samples using novel proteomic technologies that provide high-throughput, in-depth analysis and quantification of the proteome. Several of these studies have revealed promising biomarkers for use in diagnosis, assessment of prognosis, and targeting treatment of prostate cancer. This review focuses on prostate cancer proteomic biomarker discovery and its future potential.

New molecular biomarkers for the prognosis and management of prostate cancer--the post PSA era.

The widespread use of the PSA test has led to increased detection of the disease at earlier stages and a reduction in the number of patients where metastatic disease is found at diagnosis. However, there are significant limitations to the PSA test such as its lack of specificity, elevation in benign disease and failure to detect a significant number of PSA-negative tumours. Therefore, PSA is now commonly regarded as an indicator of prostate volume and is not independently diagnostic or prognostic in prostate cancer. Due to these limitations, there is an urgent need for new prognostic biomarkers to enhance the clinical management of prostate cancer. There have been many recent advances in high-throughput technologies for measuring gene and protein expression in minimally invasive samples (e.g. blood, urine) that could more accurately predict disease progression. This review article gives a brief overview of biomarkers that are currently showing prognostic potential in prostate cancer research.