Abstract 3062: Isolation and characterization of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) from peripheral blood specimens of patients with advanced solid tumor malignancies (using ApoStream™ instrumentation)

• Published in: Cancer research (Chicago, Ill.) Ill.), 2014-10, Vol.74 (19_Supplement), p.3062-3062
• Main Authors: Balasubramanian, Priya, Wang, Lihua, Lawrence, Scott M., Navas, Tony, Kummar, Shivaani, Hollingshead, Melinda, Owusu, Francis, Parchment, Ralph E., Tomaszewski, Joseph E., Doroshow, James H., Kinders, Robert J.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• ISSN: 0008-5472; 1538-7445
• DOI: 10.1158/1538-7445.AM2014-3062

Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) isolated from the peripheral blood of cancer patients provide prognostic information and may inform treatment decisions. Current strategies for CTC isolation and characterization commonly employ epithelial marker-specific antibody capture of fixed cells from blood and detection based on cytokeratin (CK) expression. Our laboratory is currently evaluating an antibody-independent CTC enrichment technology, ApoStream™, which isolates live CTCs from blood, enabled by critical dissimilarities in morphology and dielectric properties of CTCs and blood cells rather than surface marker expression. CTCs isolated with the ApoStream™ instrument are amenable to further high resolution phenotypic characterization, enabling unambiguous identification of enriched cells as malignant cells. We previously reported on the utility of ApoStream™ technology for the isolation of CTCs from patients with advanced alveolar soft part sarcoma (ASPS) with unambiguous confirmation of CTCs by break-apart fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH) for ASPL-TFE3 gene translocation. Here, we show the isolation of viable CTCs from patients with advanced solid tumors from ongoing clinical studies at the NCI. Since during progression, cancer cells undergo epithelial to mesenchymal transitions (EMT) and mesenchymal to epithelial transitions (MET), we sought to characterize ApoStream™-isolated CTCs using a multiplex phenotyping assay for CD45 (hematopoietic marker), EMT markers (CK, EpCAM, β-catenin and Vimentin), and tumor specific markers (MUC1 and CEA). A user-defined processing algorithm and CTC scoring criteria developed using Definiens® software was used for rare cell detection and enumeration. Our current efforts are focused on evaluating the utility of ApoStream™-isolated CTCs for assessing pharmacodynamic effects of anticancer agents on DNA damage response in patients with refractory solid tumors. Funded by NCI Contract No. HHSN261200800001E. Citation Format: Priya Balasubramanian, Lihua Wang, Scott M. Lawrence, Tony Navas, Shivaani Kummar, Melinda Hollingshead, Francis Owusu, Ralph E. Parchment, Joseph E. Tomaszewski, James H. Doroshow, Robert J. Kinders. Isolation and characterization of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) from peripheral blood specimens of patients with advanced solid tumor malignancies (using ApoStream™ instrumentation). [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 105th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2014 Apr 5-9; San D