Professor Cho Nam-hoon’s Research Team Develops Kidney Cancer Biomarkers Medical practitioners will soon be able to diagnose kidney cancer through blood tests. Professor Cho Nam-hoon’s research team from the Pathology Department of Yonsei University’s College of Medicine has developed biomarkers that are able to identify kidney cancer. According to a report by the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), the new immunosorbent assay developed by Professor Cho’s team is an ideal screening test for the early detection of malignant kidney cancer. The new immunosorbent assay, which measures three kidney cancer-related fluorescence sensitivity biomarkers, NNMT, LCP1, and NM23A, was jointly developed by Professor Cho Nam-hoon (Pathology), Professor Choi Young-deuk (Urology), and Genomine Inc. The study analyzed the three biomarkers in 189 serums from 87 patients diagnosed with tumors and a control group of 102 people. Their study revealed a higher prevalence of all three biomarkers in the cancer patients compared to those in the control group. According to Professor Cho: “If these biomarkers are adopted to spot early kidney cancer, the number of deaths will decrease due to early detection.” The team’s diagnostic method has already received CE marking in Europe, and final approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is pending.