Clinical proteomics for prostate cancer: understanding prostate cancer pathology and protein biomarkers for improved disease management

Table 3 Sample selection for biomarker discovery

	Tissue		Body fluids
	Biopsy	Needle biopsy	Serum and plasma	Urine	Prostatic fluid and seminal plasma
Advantages	Direct analysis of tumor protein expression/activation		Non-invasive collection	Non-invasive collection	Minimally invasive collection
	Diagnostic markers		Fast and low-cost sample preparation	High volume	Rich in prostate-derived proteins
	Prognostic markers		Diagnostic markers	Rich in prostate-derived proteins	Fast and low-cost sample preparation
	Most useful for patient stratification in terms of response to therapy		Prognostic markers	Fast and low-cost sample preparation	Diagnostic markers
				Diagnostic markers	Prognostic markers
				Prognostic markers
Limitations	Invasive collection		Low abundance of potential biomarkers	Low abundance of potential biomarkers	Low abundance of potential biomarkers
	Limited quantity		Dynamic concentration range	Dynamic concentration range	Dynamic concentration range
	Must be snap-frozen within 30 min from collection		Intra and inter-patient variability in composition	Intra and inter-patient variability in composition	Intra and inter-patient variability in composition
	Complicated sample preparation Tissue Sampling Errors			Variability in sample collection

ISSN: 1559-0275