Shopping Cart (0)
My Account

Shopping Cart
SELECTBIO Conferences Liquid Biopsies 2019

Yazhen Zhu's Biography



Yazhen Zhu, Assistant Professor, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA

Dr. Yazhen Zhu is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine in David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. Since she joined liquid biopsy program in UCLA in 2017, she has been working to develop liquid biopsy-based technologies for implementation of non-invasive diagnosis in the fields of cancer and maternal-fetal medicine. Her research efforts are currently supported by NIH. Before joining UCLA, Dr. Zhu was a clinical pathologist who had accumulated extensive hands-on experience in the fields of surgical and molecular pathology. She was also in charge of a molecular diagnostic laboratory, where she developed and validated a collection of laboratory-developed tests (LDTs) for cancer diagnosis.

Yazhen Zhu Image

Quantitative Detection of Gene Rearrangements Using Circulating Tumor Cells Purified by a Covalent Chemistry-Enabled Platform

Thursday, 28 March 2019 at 13:00

Add to Calendar ▼2019-03-28 13:00:002019-03-28 14:00:00Europe/LondonQuantitative Detection of Gene Rearrangements Using Circulating Tumor Cells Purified by a Covalent Chemistry-Enabled PlatformLiquid Biopsies 2019 in Coronado Island, CaliforniaCoronado Island, CaliforniaSELECTBIOenquiries@selectbiosciences.com

Recent research focus in the field of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) has moved beyond the simple capture or enumeration of CTCs and gravitated towards approaches that allow for in-depth molecular analysis. Unlike circulating tumor DNA or RNA which is highly fragmented and compounded by significant background, CTCs house intact genomic DNA and RNA,providing more reliable genetic information about tumors. Exploring the use of CTC-derived mRNA offers a non-invasive diagnostic solution for understanding underlying tumor biology, guiding treatment intervention, and monitoring disease progression. Recently, we demonstrated a new covalent chemistry-enabled CTC capture/release platform – “Click Chip”. This platform is designed by integrating bioorthogonal ligation-mediated CTC capture (sensitive and rapid) and disulfide cleavage-driven CTC release (mild, specific, and rapid) on nanostructured substrates to enable more efficient purification of pooled CTCs with high-quality intact CTC-derived mRNA. The CTC-derived mRNA was subjected to RT-droplet digital PCR (RT-ddPCR). ALK/ROS1 rearrangements were quantified using CTC-mRNA recovered by Click Chips and matched with those identified in biopsy specimen in late-stage ALK/ROS1 positive NSCLC patients. Moreover, copy numbers of ALK/ROS1 rearrangements in CTCs and CTC counts could be used together for evaluating ALK/ROS1-TKI treatment responses and disease progression. This streamlined diagnostic workflow is optimum for gene rearrangement detection and quantification based on high-quality intact CTC-derived mRNA.


Add to Calendar ▼2019-03-27 00:00:002019-03-29 00:00:00Europe/LondonLiquid Biopsies 2019Liquid Biopsies 2019 in Coronado Island, CaliforniaCoronado Island, CaliforniaSELECTBIOenquiries@selectbiosciences.com