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Tests that read RNA from blood or urine, carried in tiny membrane packets, platelets or protein complexes, to find a cancer or read what its cells are doing.
A tumour's RNA reaches blood and urine inside extracellular vesicles, bound to proteins, or taken up by platelets, and tests can read it there. Several urine tests are in routine use: ExoDx Prostate (three genes from urine vesicles), SelectMDx, MyProstateScore 2.0 and the Xpert Bladder Cancer Monitor, and Medicare's prostate biomarker policy lists the first three. In blood the field is younger: GRAIL's cell-free transcriptome study found that 68 per cent of 57,820 annotated genes are not detected in plasma from people without cancer, so tumour transcripts in those 'dark channels' stand out against a quiet background (Larson 2021); Exai Bio's orphan non-coding RNAs detected lung and colorectal cancer in validation sets (Karimzadeh 2024, Momen-Roknabadi 2025); and platelet RNA sequencing separated cancer from health in research cohorts (Best 2015).
The limits are measured. Naked RNA does not survive in plasma: more than 99 per cent of added free RNA could no longer be amplified after 15 seconds, while the body's own plasma RNA was stable for 24 hours in blood kept at 4 degrees (Tsui 2002), which is why what survives is packaged. Most of it comes from blood cells: 74 per cent (plus or minus 10) of circulating transcripts in people without cancer were from blood cells (Larson 2021, full text). No published study states a tumour fraction for cell-free RNA in parts per million, the unit residual disease DNA tests use, and no reference material for cell-free RNA assays was found.
RNA is extracted from plasma, urine, isolated vesicles or platelets, converted to DNA and measured by reverse-transcription PCR, targeted panels, microarrays or sequencing; a classifier turns the pattern into a score, or a tumour-specific transcript or fusion is called directly.
A urine test that reads three genes from tiny vesicles shed by the prostate to estimate the chance of a significant prostate cancer, to help decide whether a biopsy is needed.
A urine test that reads small RNAs from tiny vesicles to detect prostate cancer and judge its grade, so far validated in a case-control study.
A urine test that reads 18 prostate cancer genes to estimate the chance of a cancer worth treating, to help decide on a biopsy.
The first urine RNA test for prostate cancer approved in the United States; its approval has since been withdrawn, though Medicare still lists it.
A urine test taken after a prostate examination that reads two genes to estimate the chance of a high-grade cancer; its maker is moving customers to its newer urine test.
An Amsterdam research test that reads RNA inside blood platelets and detected 18 cancer types in a laboratory study, though it often flagged people with other illnesses.
A urine test that reads five RNA markers to check for bladder cancer coming back, and in a Danish trial halved the number of camera examinations of the bladder.
The closest published result to an RNA residual disease test in breast cancer: a burden score that tracks outcome, without a stated detection limit.
Cell-free orphan RNAs detect early colorectal cancer in a case-control setting.
Same-draw RNA and DNA together catch fusions one alone misses.
Capturing tumour vesicles by a surface marker before reading their RNA is feasible; it was tested for detection, not residual disease.
A urine RNA test cut camera examinations by more than half in this trial, with two missed recurrences.
Tumour-specific small RNAs are readable in serum; the specificity is too low for population screening as reported.
A urine RNA panel can rule out significant prostate cancer for many men.
Any tumour RNA in blood is read against a large background from blood cells.
Query for this technology: (TITLE:"Liquid RNA biopsy" OR ABSTRACT:"Liquid RNA biopsy" OR TITLE:"cell-free, vesicle and platelet RNA" OR ABSTRACT:"cell-free, vesicle and platelet RNA" OR TITLE:"cell-free RNA" OR ABSTRACT:"cell-free RNA" OR TITLE:"cfRNA" OR ABSTRACT:"cfRNA") AND (cancer OR tumor OR tumour OR oncology OR carcinoma OR lymphoma OR leukemia OR leukaemia OR myeloma OR sarcoma OR melanoma OR glioma). Results are unfiltered search hits about Liquid RNA biopsy (cell-free, vesicle and platelet RNA), not a curated reading list.
Shares Cell types of origin of the cell-free transcriptome, Stability of endogenous and added RNA in blood specimens, serum, and plasma, Deep generative AI models analyzing circulating orphan non-coding RNAs enable detection of early-stage lung cancer, Detection of Early-Stage Colorectal Cancer Using Cell-Free oncRNA Biomarkers and Artificial Intelligence.
Shares A Novel Urine Exosome Gene Expression Assay to Predict High-grade Prostate Cancer at Initial Biopsy, Development and Validation of an 18-Gene Urine Test for High-Grade Prostate Cancer, MyProstateScore 2.0, SelectMDx.
Shares Xpert Bladder Cancer Monitor, Urine tests for bladder cancer (cytology, FISH, RNA and methylation), RNA sequencing & expression profiling, Bladder & urothelial cancer.
Shares SelectMDx, ExoDx Prostate (IntelliScore), Prostate cancer.
Shares Exai Bio, RNA sequencing & expression profiling, Multi-cancer early detection (MCED), Liquid biopsy (ctDNA).
Shares thromboSeq (tumour-educated platelet RNA), RNA sequencing & expression profiling, Multi-cancer early detection (MCED).
Shares RNA sequencing & expression profiling, Multi-cancer early detection (MCED), Liquid biopsy (ctDNA), Colorectal cancer.
Shares Urine tests for bladder cancer (cytology, FISH, RNA and methylation), Bladder & urothelial cancer, Liquid biopsy (ctDNA), Non-small-cell lung cancer.
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