Evidence map›Paper›PMID 33095819›Full record

ArticlePloS one2020

Antigen-agnostic microfluidics-based circulating tumor cell enrichment and downstream molecular characterization.

Evan N Cohen, Gitanjali Jayachandran, Max R Hardy, Ananya M Venkata Subramanian, Xiangtian Meng, James M Reuben

Open access · goldAbstract readEvaluation StudyValidation Study
In one paragraph

Article in PloS one, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 18 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
18citing papers in PubMed, 1 pooled it
1.3field-weighted citation impact, top 17% 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

18 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 22 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. Pooled it
  2. Feasibility ofGeburtshilfe und Frauenheilkunde · 2026
    Article
  3. Review
  4. Circulating Tumor Cells: Emerging Frontiers in Cancer Technology.Expert reviews in molecular medicine · 2026
    Review
  5. Article
  6. Article
  7. Article
  8. Article
  9. Article
  10. Article
  11. Article
  12. Article
  13. Article
  14. Circulating tumor cells in colorectal cancer in the era of precision medicine.Journal of molecular medicine (Berlin, Germany) · 2022
    Review
  15. Review
  16. Review
  17. Review
  18. Review
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

6 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.

Evan N CohenDivision of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Department of Hematopathology, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas, United States of America.ORCID 0000-0003-4192-9644
Gitanjali JayachandranDivision of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Department of Hematopathology, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas, United States of America.
Max R HardyDivision of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Department of Hematopathology, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas, United States of America.
Ananya M Venkata SubramanianDivision of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Department of Hematopathology, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas, United States of America.
Xiangtian MengDivision of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Department of Hematopathology, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas, United States of America.
James M ReubenDivision of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Department of Hematopathology, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas, United States of America.
The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center · US

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Circulating tumor cells (CTC) isolated from the peripheral blood of cancer patients by a minimally invasive procedure provide surrogate markers of the tumor that can be repeatedly sampled. However, the selection and enumeration of CTCs by traditional methods based on surface proteins like EPCAM may not detect CTCs with a mesenchymal phenotype. Here, we employed an antibody-agnostic platform, the Parsortix® PR1 system, which enriches CTCs based on cell size and membrane deformability. We evaluated the linearity, sensitivity, and specificity of the Parsortix PR1 system in tandem with 3 downstream molecular characterization techniques using healthy donor blood spiked with cultured cell lines. Signal amplification of mRNA using a QuantiGene 25-gene assay was able to quantitate multiple epithelial genes, including CDH1, EGFR, ERBB2, KRT18, and MUC1, from high numbers of spiked cells and was able to detect KRT18 when only 50 MCF-7 or SUM190 cells were spiked into healthy donor blood. However, target amplification of mRNA by quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) showed better sensitivity; qPCR without pre-amplification was able to detect CTC-related genes in Parsortix PR1-enriched cells when as few as 5 SKBR3 cells were spiked into blood. Finally, the HTG EdgeSeq nuclease protection assay was able to profile mRNA expression of over 2,560 cancer-related genes from Parsortix PR1 enriched cells, showing enrichment in cancer signaling pathways and ERBB2, KRT19, and KRT7. Overall, the Parsortix PR1 platform may be amenable to transition into routine clinical workflows.

Indexed as

Antigens, NeoplasmBiomarkers, TumorCell CountCell Line, TumorCell SeparationGene Expression ProfilingHealthy VolunteersHumansMicrofluidicsNeoplasmsNeoplastic Cells, CirculatingReal-Time Polymerase Chain ReactionRNA, MessengerSensitivity and SpecificityAntigens, NeoplasmBiomarkers, TumorRNA, Messenger

Identifiers

PMID33095819
PMCPMC7584183
OpenAlexW3094496211

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY
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.