Minimal Residual Disease and Circulating Tumor Cells in Breast Cancer

Minimal residual disease and circulating tumor cells in breast cancer: Open questions for research.- Minimal residual disease and breast cancer metastasis.- Self-seeding in cancer.- Microenvironments dictating tumor cell dormancy.- Technologies for circulating tumor cell (CTC) and disseminated tumor cell (DTC) detection and characterization.- Immunomagnetic separation technologies.- Microfluidic technologies for the isolation of CTCs.- EPISPOT assay: Detection of viable disseminating tumor cells in solid tumor patients.- Advances in optical technologies for rare cell detection and characterization.- Size-based enrichment technologies for circulating tumor cell (CTC) detection and characterization.- Emerging technologies for CTC detection based on depletion of normal cells.- Molecular assays for the detection and characterization of CTCs.- Multiplex molecular analysis of CTCs.- Other blood-based biomarkers.- Circulating DNA and next generation sequencing.- Circulating microRNAs as non-invasive biomarkers in breast cancer.- Circulating endothelial cells and circulating endothelial progenitors.- Disseminated tumor cells (DTCs) and circulating tumor cells (CTCs) in breast cancer clinical research and practice.- Bone marrow DTCs.- CTCs in primary breast cancer.- CTCs in early breast cancer.- CTCs in metastatic breast cancer.- HER2-positive DTCs/CTCs in breast cancer.- DTCs and CTCs in breast cancer - 5 decades later.- Drug and circulating tumor cell co-development.- Challenges in drug and biomarker co-development.- Challenges and opportunities in the use of CTCs for companion diagnostic development.