Metabolomics in Cancer Biomarker Research

Abstract

Purpose of Review: As a research tool for quantitative measurement of small molecule metabolites, metabolomics has been devoted to search for biomarkers that can be used for diagnosis and prognosis of malignant tumors. The purpose of this review is to summarize recent literatures on metabolomic-based cancer biomarker research and to discuss the current issues and challenges in the clinical applications of metabolomics technologies. Recent Findings: This article reviews metabolomics-based cancer biomarker studies reported in the past 3–5 years, summarizes the classes of potential metabolite markers, and discusses the current problems in study designs as well as analytical platforms and methodologies. Summary: The application of metabolomics showed great potential in disease diagnosis, prognosis, and patient stratifications in most types of tumors. In the future, with improvement and standardization of the study designs and analytical protocols, metabolomics can serve as an effective tool for cancer translational research.