Perspective: a program to improve protein biomarker discovery for cancer

Biomarkers for cancer risk, early detection, prognosis, and therapeutic response promise to revolutionize cancer management. Protein biomarkers offer tremendous potential in this regard due to their great diversity and intimate involvement in physiology. An effective program to discover protein biomarkers using existing technology will require team science, an integrated informatics platform, identification and quantitation of candidate biomarkers in disease tissue, mouse models of disease, standardized reagents for analyzing candidate biomarkers in bodily fluids, and implementation of automation. Technology improvements for better fractionation of the proteome, selection of specific biomarkers from complex mixtures, and multiplexed assay of biomarkers would greatly enhance progress.