Circulating Tumor Cells in Breast Cancer Metastatic Disease

Roberto Piñeiro completed his doctoral studies on the biology and metabolism of cardiomyocytes in 2005, in the Department of Medicine at the University of Santiago de Compostela. In 2007 he joined the Phosphoinositide group for his post-doctoral in the Blizard Institute, Queen Mary University of London, where he studied the role of the GPR55 receptor and its ligand, lysophosphatidyl inositol (LPI) on cell proliferation in prostate and ovarian cancer.Then in 2011 he was incorporated into the Cell Signalling group of Barts Cancer Institute, Queen Mary University of London, currently located at the UCL Cancer Institute, University College London. In this laboratory, Roberto worked studying the role of Class I PI3K in cell signalling in cancer and the tumour micro environment using “knock-in” mice and cellular models.He is currently Head of the Cancer Modelling Line of the Roche-Chus Joint Unit

• Preface.- Introduction – Biology of Breast Cancer Metastasis and Importance of the Analysis of CTCs.- Epithelial-Mesenchymal Plasticity in Circulating Tumor Cells, the Precursors of Metastasis.- Disseminated Tumor Cells and Dormancy in Breast Cancer Progression.- Methodology for the Isolation and Analysis of CTCs.- Advances in the Characterization of Circulating Tumor Cells in Metastatic Breast Cancer: Single Cell Analyses and Interactions, and Patient-derived Models for Drug Testing.- Circulating Tumor Cells (CTCs) Heterogeneity in Metastatic Breast Cancer: Different Approaches for Different Needs.- Relevance of CTC Clusters in Breast Cancer Metastasis.- Epigenetics of Circulating Tumor Cells in Breast Cancer.- Circulating Tumor Cells: Applications for Early Breast Cancer.- Clinical Relevance and Therapeutic Application of CTCs in Advanced Breast Cancer.