Renal Cell Carcinoma

Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is often undetected until it is in an advanced stage. Currently there are no reliable blood biomarkers to monitor the presence of the disease and/or response to therapies. Mass spectrometry (MS)-based proteomics provides tools for sensitive and high-throughput protein screening of biological samples and biomarker discovery.

SAA, an inflammatory acute phase protein, has been viewed as a biomarker of host response in many human cancers. The recently reported presence of SAA in tumor tissue suggests alternative function of the protein. Sudden disappearance of SAA versus persistent upregulation of multiple inflammatory proteins in post-nephrectomy RCC sera supports this notion. Selective proteome isolation by targeted MS is a promising analytical tool with potential clinical applications.