Evidence map›Paper›PMID 23172309›Full record

ReviewCancer research2012

Why your new cancer biomarker may never work: recurrent patterns and remarkable diversity in biomarker failures.

Scott E Kern

Abstract readReview
PubMed Full text at PMC Publisher
In one paragraph

Review in Cancer research, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 129 papers, 6 of them syntheses that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
129citing papers in PubMed, 6 pooled it
17.4field-weighted citation impact, top 1% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

129 citing papers in PubMed, 6 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 233 citations in OpenAlex.

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  11. Innovations in biomarker stratification for precision oncology.Clinical and experimental medicine · 2026
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69 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

1 author at 1 institution in 1 country.

Scott E KernThe Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins University, Department of Oncology, 1650 Orleans Avenue, Baltimore, MD 21287, USA. sk@jhmi.edu
Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center · US

Funding

Tumor Antigens for Individual Signatures and TherapyP50CA062924 · NCI · JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY · PI JAFFEE, ELIZABETH M. · 1993 to 2022
$54.6M
NCI NIH HHS CA62924NCI NIH HHS P50 CA062924
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Less than 1% of published cancer biomarkers actually enter clinical practice. Although best practices for biomarker development are published, optimistic investigators may not appreciate the statistical near-certainty and diverse modes by which the other 99% (likely including your favorite new marker) do indeed fail. Here, patterns of failure were abstracted for classification from publications and an online database detailing marker failures. Failure patterns formed a hierarchical logical structure, or outline, of an emerging, deeply complex, and arguably fascinating science of biomarker failure. A new cancer biomarker under development is likely to have already encountered one or more of the following fatal features encountered by prior markers: lack of clinical significance, hidden structure in the source data, a technically inadequate assay, inappropriate statistical methods, unmanageable domination of the data by normal variation, implausibility, deficiencies in the studied population or in the investigator system, and its disproof or abandonment for cause by others. A greater recognition of the science of biomarker failure and its near-complete ubiquity is constructive and celebrates a seemingly perpetual richness of biologic, technical, and philosophical complexity, the full appreciation of which could improve the management of scarce research resources.

Indexed as

Biomarkers, TumorHumansNeoplasmsBiomarkers, Tumor

Identifiers

PMID23172309
PMCPMC3513583
OpenAlexW2166273484

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceTDM
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.