# RNA-Seq of Tumor-Educated Platelets Enables Blood-Based Pan-Cancer, Multiclass, and Molecular Pathway Cancer Diagnostics

Source: https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-best-tumour-educated-platelets-cancer-cell-2015/  
OnCo record `paper-best-tumour-educated-platelets-cancer-cell-2015` (Key paper). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

The first study to show that RNA inside blood platelets changes enough with cancer to tell people with cancer from healthy people.

## Summary

mRNA sequencing of 283 platelet samples distinguished 228 patients with localised and metastasised tumours from 55 healthy individuals with 96 per cent accuracy, and the location of the primary tumour was correctly identified with 71 per cent accuracy across six tumour types.

## Fields

- Kind: Key paper
- Last checked: 2026-11-04
- Journal: Cancer Cell
- Year: 2015
- DOI: 10.1016/j.ccell.2015.09.018
- Authors: Best MG, Sol N, Kooi I, et al.
- Findings: 96% accuracy, cancer against healthy.; 71% accuracy for the primary site.
- What it means: Platelets carry a readable record of a tumour's presence.
- Caveats: Healthy controls, not people with other illnesses; later work found more false positives in ill controls.

## Sources

- Best et al., Cancer Cell 2015: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ccell.2015.09.018
- PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26525104/

## Connected records

- fronts: [Diagnostics & Biomarkers](https://onco.cc/fronts/diagnostics/), [Early Detection & Screening](https://onco.cc/fronts/early-detection/)
- technologies: [Liquid RNA biopsy (cell-free, vesicle and platelet RNA)](https://onco.cc/technologies/liquid-rna-biopsy/), [Multi-cancer early detection (MCED)](https://onco.cc/technologies/mced/)
- terms: [Biomarker](https://onco.cc/terms/biomarker/)
- drugs: [thromboSeq (tumour-educated platelet RNA)](https://onco.cc/drugs/thromboseq/)

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