Progress in studies on autoantibodies against tumor-associated antigens in hepatocellular carcinoma

The diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients using alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) is not accurate enough because of its low specificity. Autoantibodies as a complementary tool to AFP have attracted more and more attention. Although many kinds of autoantibodies are still unknown in patients with various cancers, autoantibodies against tumor-associated antigens (TAAs) have shown high specificities in cancer diagnosis due to the abnormal production of TAAs in cancer patients. At the present, serum proteomics analyses (SERPA), serological analyses of recombinantly expressed cDNA clone (SEREX), phage display technologies and high throughput protein microarray all have been applied in the screening of autoantibodies of HCC patients. Sometimes, the diagnosis value of a single or multiple autoantibodies can be a good complement to AFP. In this review, we describe and summarize the common technologies of screening autoantibodies and the application of autoantibodies in HCC.