MicroRNA for Cancer Diagnostic: Issues of Isolation, Quantification and Clinical Interpretation
A special issue of Diagnostics (ISSN 2075-4418). This special issue belongs to the section "Pathology and Molecular Diagnostics".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 April 2021) | Viewed by 26989
Special Issue Editor
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Since the discovery of the phenomenon of RNA interference in 1998, microRNA has been attracting a great amount of scientific interest as a natural mediator of this fundamental regulatory mechanism. MicroRNA is a class of short single-stranded RNA molecules that control stability and functionality of the messenger RNA pool and regulate many aspects of cellular biology. To date, more than four thousand miRNA molecules have been identified in human tissues. Cells of different types of tissues have a specific pattern of microRNAs, while their malignant transformation is associated with typical alteration of microRNA profiles. This indicates an option to use microRNA analysis with diagnostic purposes. Although cancer-relevant microRNA expression changes have been reported in a large number of scientific reports, microRNA-based diagnostic tests are still far from wide clinical application. Development of microRNA-based diagnostic tools is challenged by several issues. First, isolation of microRNA from biological material is hampered due to the small size of the molecules: The standard RNA purification protocols suppose large losses of these molecules. Second, the routine method of reverse transcription followed by PCR and sequencing is applicable for miRNA analysis but requires specific tricks overcoming the issues of the small size and the existence of similar and non-mature forms. Third, a robust method of normalization of microRNA expression data has still not been developed.
New approaches to implementing microRNA analysis in the clinical oncology are to be collected and presented in this Special Issue of Diagnostics. Various issues including fundamental aspects of microRNA involvement in certain cancer, methodological problems of microRNA analysis, and results interpretation are welcome to be addressed. Reports of advanced approaches of microRNA detection, such as enzyme-free and label-free platforms, are especially invited.
Dr. Anastasia Malek
Guest Editor
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Keywords
- Cancer
- Diagnostics
- microRNA profiling
- microRNA detection
- Clinical application
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