@inproceedings{01HVRMR53RQ0R4Z1PFARV8B9XF,
  abstract     = {{With its increasing incidence and dismal prognosis, pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is becoming a global oncologic problem. In PDAC patients the presence of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) in the bloodstream is associated with poor overall survival, making CTCs an interesting biomarker. However, detecting CTCs in PDAC patients remains challenging since they are found at very low numbers in blood and consist of various subtypes. The Parsortix® device captures CTCs from blood samples based on cell size and deformability. We evaluated its ability to enrich and capture different subtypes of pancreatic cancer cells. 
Three pancreatic cancer cell lines, mimicking different CTC subtypes (epithelial, mesenchymal, and intermediate), were stained with a CellTracker Dye and spiked into blood samples from healthy donors. These samples were then processed using the Parsortix® and recovery rates were determined by quantifying the number of cancer cells present after enrichment. The mesenchymal cell line had a lower recovery rate (32.8 ± 10.2%) compared to the epithelial cell line (62.6 ± 18.5%). Using proteomics by data-independent acquisition (DIA)-mass spectrometry (MS), differentially expressed proteins and pathways were identified. The Rho signaling pathway was found downregulated in the mesenchymal cell line compared to the epithelial cell line. This pathway is a key regulator of the cytoskeleton and implicated in cell contractility. Therefore, we are currently investigating if activating the Rho signaling pathway can induce a stiffer cellular phenotype, reduce deformability, and improve Parsortix®-based cell enrichment. 
Our study highlights the importance of evaluating the recovery rates for different CTC subtypes to develop more effective methods for capturing the heterogeneity of CTCs in liquid biopsies. We hypothesize that introducing an activator of the Rho pathway into PDAC patient blood samples to stiffen CTCs, could enhance recovery rates and facilitate downstream analyses, potentially enhancing the diagnostic and therapeutic utility of CTCs in pancreatic cancer.}},
  articleno    = {{P19}},
  author       = {{Vandenbussche, Nele and Lintermans, Béatrice and Merckaert, Tijs and Fieuws, Charlotte and Gevaert, Kris and Claes, Kathleen}},
  booktitle    = {{Belgian Society for Human Genetics (BeSHG) Annual Symposium 2024 : Single Cells : to care or not to care, Abstracts}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  location     = {{Leuven, Belgium}},
  title        = {{Towards improved Parsortix® efficiency for circulating tumor cell enrichment in pancreatic cancer}},
  url          = {{https://beshg.be/storage/app/media/Meetings/Meeting%202024/BeSHG2024_Program%20booklet_%20Final.pdf}},
  year         = {{2024}},
}