Rectal cancer patients frequently receive pre-operative radiotherapy (RT), prior to surgical resection. However, colorectal cancer is heterogeneous and the degree of tumour response to pre-operative RT is highly variable. There are currently no clinically approved methods of predicting response to RT, and a significant proportion of patients will show no clinical benefit, despite enduring the side-effects. We evaluated the use of Raman spectroscopy (RS), a non-destructive technique able to provide the unique chemical fingerprint of tissues, as a potential tool to stratify patient response to pre-operative RT. Raman measurements were obtained from the formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded (FFPE) pre-treatment biopsy specimens of 20 rectal cancer patients who received pre-operative RT. A principal component analysis and linear discriminant analysis algorithm was able to classify patient response to pre-operative RT as good or poor, with an accuracy of 86.04 ± 0.14% (standard error). Patients with a good response to RT showed greater contributions from protein-associated peaks, whereas patients who responded poorly showed greater lipid contributions. These results demonstrate that RS is able to reliably classify tumour response to pre-operative RT from FFPE biopsies and highlights its potential to guide personalised cancer patient treatment.

中文翻译：

---

开发基于拉曼光谱的工具来分层患者对直肠癌术前放疗的反应

直肠癌患者经常在手术切除之前接受术前放疗 (RT)。然而，结直肠癌具有异质性，肿瘤对术前放疗的反应程度差异很大。目前没有临床批准的预测放疗反应的方法，尽管有副作用，但很大一部分患者不会显示出临床益处。我们评估了拉曼光谱 (RS) 的使用，这是一种能够提供组织独特化学指纹的非破坏性技术，作为对患者对术前放疗的反应进行分层的潜在工具。拉曼测量来自 20 名接受术前 RT 的直肠癌患者的福尔马林固定、石蜡包埋 (FFPE) 治疗前活检标本。主成分分析和线性判别分析算法能够将患者对术前放疗的反应分为好或差，准确度为 86.04 ± 0.14%（标准误差）。对 RT 反应良好的患者表现出来自蛋白质相关峰的更大贡献，而反应不佳的患者表现出更大的脂质贡献。这些结果表明，RS 能够可靠地从 FFPE 活检中对肿瘤对术前放疗的反应进行分类，并突出其指导个性化癌症患者治疗的潜力。而反应不佳的患者则表现出更大的脂质贡献。这些结果表明，RS 能够可靠地从 FFPE 活检中对肿瘤对术前放疗的反应进行分类，并突出其指导个性化癌症患者治疗的潜力。而反应不佳的患者则表现出更大的脂质贡献。这些结果表明，RS 能够可靠地从 FFPE 活检中对肿瘤对术前放疗的反应进行分类，并突出其指导个性化癌症患者治疗的潜力。