Glycomics of prostate cancer: updates

ABSTRACT

Introduction: Prostate cancer (PCa) is a life-threatening disease affecting millions of men. The current best PCa biomarker (level of prostate-specific antigen in serum) lacks specificity for PCa diagnostics and this is why novel PCa biomarkers in addition to the conventional ones based on biomolecules such as DNA, RNA and proteins need to be identified.

Areas covered: This review details the potential of glycans-based biomarkers to become diagnostic, prognostic, predictive and therapeutic PCa biomarkers with a brief description of the innovative approaches applied to glycan analysis to date. Finally, the review covers the possibility to use exosomes as a rich source of glycans for future innovative and advanced diagnostics of PCa. The review covers updates in the field since 2016.

Expert commentary: The summary provided in this review paper suggests that glycan-based biomarkers can offer high-assay accuracy not only for diagnostic purposes but also for monitoring/surveillance of the PCa disease.

KEYWORDS:

• Prostate cancer
• diagnostics
• glycan analysis
• glycomics
• lectins
• exosomes
• biomarkers

Declaration of interest

The authors have no relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. This includes employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, grants or patents received or pending, or royalties.

Reviewer disclosures

Peer reviewers on this manuscript have no relevant financial or other relationships to disclose.

Additional information

Funding

The financial support received from the Scientific Grant Agency VEGA 2/0137/18 and 2/0090/16 from the Slovak Research and Development Agency APVV 17–0300 and APVV-15–0227 is acknowledged. The research received funding from European Research Council (no. 825586). This publication is the result of the project implementation: Centre for materials, layers and systems for applications and chemical processes under extreme conditions – Stage I, ITMS no.: 26240120007, supported by the ERDF.