Researchers at the CIO use induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) technologies to studying tumor precursors and develop models of early carcinogenesis. By selecting iPSC lines from patients across the spectrum of genetic cancer risk, researchers are asking how inherited genetic variants cause cancer predisposition by developing patient avatars of early tumor formation. Those avatars can then be used to identify early-stage biomarkers, or test novel cancer prevention drugs.
Our translational research activities are focused on targeted surgical prevention. For the most common ovarian cancer subtype, surgical removal of fallopian tubes (salpingectomy) can massively reduce a patients risk of ovarian cancer later in life. CIO projects are identifying creative ways to maximize uptake of salpingectomy, particularly in Hispanic women who have been under-represented in ovarian cancer prevention studies to date.