Stanford scientists among those funded by Stand Up To Cancer

Maximilian Diehn, Sanjiv “Sam” Gambhir, Ash Alizadeh and Young-Jun Jeon will work on “dream teams” aiming to improve detection of cancer.

Several Stanford Medicine researchers are on “dream teams” that will receive funding from the organization Stand Up To Cancer to develop strategies to detect and treat early-stage cancer.

Maximilian Diehn, MD, PhD, assistant professor of radiation oncology, is a co-leader of the SU2C-LUNGevity American Lung Association Lung Interception Translational Research Team, which received a $2 million grant. The team will work on developing a diagnostic tool that uses information from low-dose CT scans and from blood-based assays, which detect circulating tumor DNA and cells. The funding will support development and pilot testing of the tool, which aims to speed the detection of lung cancer. Ash Alizadeh, MD, PhD, assistant professor of medicine, and postdoctoral scholar Young-Jun Jeon, PhD, also are on the team.

In addition, Sanjiv “Sam” Gambhir, MD, PhD, professor and chair of radiology and director of the Canary Center for Cancer Early Detection at Stanford, is the principal Stanford investigator of the SU2C-LUNGevity American Lung Association Lung Cancer Interception Dream Team. This $5 million, four-year project entails creating a molecular atlas of precancerous lung tissue; developing blood tests capable of identifying patients with early lung cancer recurrence and nasal, blood and radiological techniques to discern whether abnormalities on chest imaging are cancerous; and developing tests to determine who is most likely to benefit from particular treatment strategies. The team is a collaboration between Stanford, Johns Hopkins University, UCLA, Boston University, Harvard University and the Francis Crick Institute.

Stand Up To Cancer is a program of the Entertainment Industry Foundation. 

About Stanford Medicine

Stanford Medicine is an integrated academic health system comprising the Stanford School of Medicine and adult and pediatric health care delivery systems. Together, they harness the full potential of biomedicine through collaborative research, education and clinical care for patients. For more information, please visit med.stanford.edu.

2023 ISSUE 3

Exploring ways AI is applied to health care