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A workshop on non-invasive biomarkers for cancer to be held in May 2015 has been organised as part of the EMRP MetVes Project.

Microvesicles, present in bodily fluids such as blood and urine, can be used as non-invasive biomarkers for diseases such as cancer, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Despite their clinical relevance, microvesicles’ extremely small size and heterogeneity make them difficult to detect, limiting their usefulness as a diagnostic tool.

The EMRP MetVes project 'Metrological characterisation of micro-vesicles from body fluids as non-invasive diagnostic biomarkers' has organised a workshop, 'Metrological Characterization of Microvesicles', to show how metrology has improved the detection and characterization of microvesicles in clinical samples, through standardization of sample preparation and comparison of measurement techniques. An example of which is an isolation method, size-exclusion chromatography, which METVES has introduced in the vesicle field. Within a year, over 140 laboratories have adapted to this isolation method. The front cover of the November 2014 issue of the AMC (Academic Medical Centre) magazine shows isolation of vesicles by METVES researcher Yuana Yuana, indicating the clinical interest. Furthermore, she was invited by the ISEV to give a presentation during the Educational day of the ISEV meeting in Washington (April 2015).

Find out more about the MetVes workshop 

Find out more about EMRP project HLT02 MetVes