Microvesicles as a Source of Prostate Cancer Biomarkers.

Prostate cancer is a global health problem and represents 12% of all cancer cases worldwide. Until now, prostate specific antigen has been extensively used as a biomarker for prostate cancer. However, this marker has serious limitations as a tumour marker since its use has lead to overdiagnosis and overtreatment of the disease and provides limited information about cancer aggressiveness. There are currently no other reliable non-invasive diagnostic method on the market The present technology is based on t he recent discovery that prostate cancer patients have increased levels of microvesicles in blood compared to healthy controls, suggesting that molecules that are carried or embedded in the membrane of these vesicles are promising biomarkers for prostate cancer. We have characterized the protein and lipid composition of microvesicles released by prostate cancer cells and identified specific molecules that can be used as biomarkers of the disease. These data are included in two patent applications. In thi s project, which is accepted as a commercialization project by the technology transfer office Inven2, we will verify the use of selected molecules as prostate cancer biomarkers in biological fluids such as urine (preferably) or blood from prostate cancer patients and controls, and simplify our current detection method in order to adapt it for kit development. The primary customers of our technology will be manufacturers of diagnostic tools while clinical laboratories in hospitals (end-users of the inventi on) will use our invention to detect and follow up prostate cancer in a noninvasive way. A successful test with better specificity and that enables better detection and follow-up of prostate cancer than the existing methods may substitute current methods and will have a big market potential. A market forecast on prostate cancer molecular diagnostics suggests that the market will grow from a world total sales of $972 million in 2011 to $2,129 million in 2016.