General introduction and thesis outline 15 1 proteomic-based profiling in liquid biopsies holds significant promise. Given that proteins represent the direct drug targets of many cancer therapies, including ICB, high dimensional proteomic data can be used for biomarker discovery. Furthermore, other body fluids, such as pleural effusion, ascites and cerebrospinal fluid, can also serve as alternative source for biomarker identification52. Among these, pleural effusion stands out as an attractive bio‑source for molecular profiling in NSCLC, particularly considering that approximately 30% of NSCLC patients develop malignant pleural effusion (MPE)53. Unfortunately, the quantity of tumor cells or the tumor cell percentage in MPE often proves insufficient for molecular analysis. Other studies have shown promising results by using cell-free DNA (cfDNA) from the supernatant of MPE54‑59.
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