About the Authors

Verena Tiran

Affiliation Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Oncology, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria

Stefanie Stanzer

Affiliation Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Oncology, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria

Ellen Heitzer

Affiliation Institute of Human Genetics, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria

Michael Meilinger

Affiliations Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Pulmonology, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria, Second Internal Division of Pulmonology, Otto Wagner Spital, Vienna, Austria

Christopher Rossmann

Affiliation Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Oncology, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria

Sigurd Lax

Affiliation Institute of Pathology, LKH Graz West, Graz, Austria

Oleksiy Tsybrovskyy

Affiliation Institute of Pathology, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria

Nadia Dandachi

nadia.dandachi@medunigraz.at (ND); marija.balic@medunigraz.at (MB)

Affiliations Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Oncology, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria, Research Unit Epigenetic and Genetic Cancer Biomarkers, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria

Marija Balic

nadia.dandachi@medunigraz.at (ND); marija.balic@medunigraz.at (MB)

Affiliations Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Oncology, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria, Research Unit Circulating Tumor Cells and Cancer Stem Cells, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria

Competing Interests

This study was funded by the Oesterreichische Nationalbank with the grant number 14001, but the funding source had no influence in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. This does not alter our adherence to PLoS One policies on sharing data and materials.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization: SS MB ND. Data curation: ND. Formal analysis: EH VT. Funding acquisition: SS MB. Investigation: VT SS MM OT CR. Methodology: SL MB MM. Project administration: SL MB. Resources: MM OT SL MB CR. Software: EH ND. Supervision: SL MB. Validation: VT EH. Visualization: EH VT. Writing – original draft: VT ND MB. Writing – review & editing: MB ND.