ReviewNature reviews. Cancer2021
Synthetic biomarkers: a twenty-first century path to early cancer detection.
Review in Nature reviews. Cancer, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 78 papers.
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.
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.
Who cites it
78 citing papers in PubMed, 188 citations in OpenAlex.
- Cascade-driven dual-signal attenuation antifouling immunosensor for femtogram-level sensing for SCCA.Analytical and bioanalytical chemistry · 2026Article
- Understanding and targeting the tumour matrisome.Nature reviews. Clinical oncology · 2026Review
- Ingestible probes for breath-based monitoring of drug-metabolizing activity from the microbiome.Science advances · 2026Article
- Integrating structurally defined DNA-carbon nanotube sensors with machine learning for cancer detection.Science advances · 2026Article
- Machine learning-driven cancer diagnostics with improved robustness and interpretability.Chemical science · 2026Review
- Long-Acting Dynamic Therapy Using X-Ray Activated Organic Nanoparticles for Afterglow Imaging Guided Deep Tumor Treatment.Angewandte Chemie (International ed. in English) · 2026Article
- Programmable Nucleic Acid Sensing in Human Cells Using Circularizable ssDNA.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Bioorthogonal Click Chemistry-Enabled Enrichment of Extracellular Vesicles for Integrated Molecular and Functional Liquid Biopsy§.Accounts of chemical research · 2026Article
- Early Detection and Inhibition of Post-Surgical Cancer Recurrence by Synthetic Extracellular Vesicles.Advanced science (Weinheim, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany) · 2026Article
- Nanosensor-coated catheters for bladder cancer detection.Nature nanotechnology · 2026Article
- Chemical efflux imaging using an annular nanosensor array for in situ bladder cancer detection.Nature nanotechnology · 2026Article
- Monitoring in vivo transcription with synthetic serum markers.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Proteolysis activity mapping and substrate discovery platform for identifying tumor-activated biosensors.Nature chemical biology · 2026Article
- Innovative approaches for lung cancer screening and interception.Nature reviews. Clinical oncology · 2026Review
- Urinary detection of therapy-induced senescence and fibrosis using an injectable albumin-based nanoprobe.Nature aging · 2026Article
- Dual-biomarkers encoding tumor-activatable minicircles with scaffold/matrix attachment region motif for sensitive and sustained blood and urine-based cancer detection.Cancer cell international · 2026Article
- Gas vortex discovery in butterfly microcavities for constructing ultrasensitive gas sensors.Science advances · 2026Article
- Matrix Metalloproteinase‑9 (MMP-9) Activatable Gold Nanoparticles forACS applied nano materials · 2026Article
- Article
- A Mechanophenotyping chip for high-throughput detection of metastatic bacteria-infected circulating tumor cells.Nature communications · 2026Article
18 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Detection of cancer at an early stage when it is still localized improves patient response to medical interventions for most cancer types. The success of screening tools such as cervical cytology to reduce mortality has spurred significant interest in new methods for early detection (for example, using non-invasive blood-based or biofluid-based biomarkers). Yet biomarkers shed from early lesions are limited by fundamental biological and mass transport barriers - such as short circulation times and blood dilution - that limit early detection. To address this issue, synthetic biomarkers are being developed. These represent an emerging class of diagnostics that deploy bioengineered sensors inside the body to query early-stage tumours and amplify disease signals to levels that could potentially exceed those of shed biomarkers. These strategies leverage design principles and advances from chemistry, synthetic biology and cell engineering. In this Review, we discuss the rationale for development of biofluid-based synthetic biomarkers. We examine how these strategies harness dysregulated features of tumours to amplify detection signals, use tumour-selective activation to increase specificity and leverage natural processing of bodily fluids (for example, blood, urine and proximal fluids) for easy detection. Finally, we highlight the challenges that exist for preclinical development and clinical translation of synthetic biomarker diagnostics.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
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.