Screening of nasopharyngeal carcinoma using plasma Epstein-Barr virus DNA for at-risk population

Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is a prominent cancer in Southeast Asia. Decades of studies have shown that NPC is closely associated with infection of the human herpesvirus, Epstein-Barr virus (EBV). Quantitative real-time PCR-based technique was developed to detect circulating cell-free EBV DNA (cf-EBV DNA) as a biomarker for NPC in 1999 by a team led by Dr. Lo in Hong Kong (1).