Arnaud Pommier

Patients with pancreatic cancer often have elevated blood levels of CA19-9, a carbohydrate antigen present on many proteins. CA19-9 is thus commonly used as a biomarker for diagnosing and monitoring disease progression. In a study of mice, Engle et al. found that CA19-9 may be more than an innocent bystander that marks the presence of pancreatic disease; it may play a causal role in disease (see the Perspective by Halbrook and Crawford).

Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDA) is the fourth most common cause of death from cancer worldwide and has a 5-year survival rate of 6%. Patients who have had their primary PDA surgically resected often develop metastatic disease, despite intra-operative examination of the liver confirming the absence of macrometastatic lesions.

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