New Biomarkers for Early Detection of Hepatocellular Carcinoma

Although considerable progress has been made in treatments of (Hong et al., 2015). Anti-TAA antibodies might reflect molecular events hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), no effective systemic cytotoxic chemotherapy has been established (Lopez et al., 2006). Surgical resection or percutaneous intervention (radiofrequency ablation and ethanol injection) therapy is effective only at an early stage of HCC. Approximately 70% of these patients develop recurrent tumors within five years. Transarterial chemoembolization is reserved for patient intermediate stageHCCwithout portal invasion or extrahepaticmetastasis.Molecular target therapy, especially that targeting the angiogenesis pathway, is now developing as a novel anti-HCC therapy. However to date, none of these novel has exhibited superior efficacy to sorafenib. Although, sorafenib is the only currently available therapeutic option for patients with advanced-stage HCC, they are required to have a performance status of 0–2 and an A Child–Pugh classification (Llovet and Bruix, 2008). Overall, with the currently available diagnostic techniques and therapies, the prognosis of HCC depends on the stage of the disease at the time of diagnosis and remaining liver function. Thus, lesions detected at screening must be aggressively investigated because treatment of early HCC has a high cure rate. Patients at risk for HCC should undergo surveillance with ultrasonography, CT scan, orMRI at 6-monthly intervals. Serum-α-fetoprotein (AFP) and protein induced vitamin K absence (PIVKA)-II are the most common markers available to detect HCC. Des gamma carboxyprothrombin (DCP), AFP-L3 (a glycosylated form of AFP which is produced in higher concentration by HCC than normal liver), Golgi membrane protein 73 (GP73), and glypican 3 (GPC3) have been proposed as surveillance tests for HCC. In patients with small tumors or in well-to-moderately differentiated HCC, serummarkers rarely elevated. Therefore, there is a need for the development of more sensitive and specific methods that supplement these tumor markers for the early detection of HCC. In the past few years, the potential utility of autoantibody to tumor-associated antigens (TAA) as cancer biomarker for early detection as indicators of disease prognosis has been explored. In this issue of EBioMedicine, HongYand colleagues investigate the serum autoantibodies to TAA, and identify that CENPF and HSP 60 were new biomarkers that would add to current markers and increase the sensitivity and specificity of early stage of HCC