Cmar_a_291906 2389..2399

1Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Peking Union Medical College Hospital, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences & Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, People’s Republic of China; 2Beijing National Laboratory for Molecular Sciences, State Key Laboratory for Rare Earth Materials Chemistry and Applications, College of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering, Peking University, Beijing, People’s Republic of China; 3State Key Laboratory of Nuclear Physics and Technology, Institute of Heavy Ion Physics, School of Physics, Peking University, Beijing, People’s Republic of China; 4Medical Science Research Center, Peking Union Medical College Hospital, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences & Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, People’s Republic of China Abstract: Ovarian cancer is the most lethal gynecologic malignancy due to the late diagnoses at advanced stages, drug resistance and the high recurrence rate. Thus, there is an urgent need to develop new techniques to diagnose and monitor ovarian cancer patients. Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy has great potential in the diagnosis of this disease, as well as the real-time monitoring of cancer development and chemoresistance. As a noninvasive, simple and convenient technique, it can not only distinguish the molecular differences between normal and malignant tissues, but also be used to identify the characteristics of different types of ovarian cancer. FTIR spectroscopy is also widely used in monitoring cancer cells in response to antitumor drugs, distinguishing cells in different growth states, and identifying new synthetic drugs. In this paper, the applications of FTIR spectroscopy for ovarian cancer diagnosis and other works carried out so far are described in detail.