why your support translates into hope—looking to the future
Ovations for the Cure of Ovarian Cancer has awarded grants to organizations such as Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Brigham and Women's Hospital. These talented investigators are working to develop tissue and serum biomarkers that will enable early detection, diagnosis and treatment. They are developing new, targeted therapies for the disease while trying to better understand why ovarian cancer cells are initially sensitive to Cisplatin. Also, investigators are focusing on quality of life research and studying how women make critical treatment decisions.
For more information on these research initiatives or to donate to a specific initiative, please contact us.
the future holds great promise through the work of the following scientist physicians:
Ursula Matulonis, M.D.
Assistant Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Director, Medical Gynecologic Oncology
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
Dr. Matulonis is the Director of Medical Gynecologic Oncology at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. She is working to develop new therapeutic agents for the treatment of ovarian cancer, to decipher the differences between premenopausal and postmenopausal ovarian cancer and to better understand how patients with ovarian cancer make medical decisions. She is also working to improve the quality of life for ovarian cancer patients. Dr. Matulonis is pursuing efforts to determine a proteomic or protein profile of patients with newly diagnosed ovarian cancer in order to try to predict prognosis, to make rational decisions about adding other more "targeted" treatments to chemotherapy and to determine why ovarian cancer is very sensitive initially to the drug Cisplatin. Dr. Matulonis is currently collaborating in the testing of a new type of drug, PARP inhibitors, against recurrent ovarian cancer.
At Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Dr. Matulonis started the tissue and clinical information bank, runs the clinical trials program in gynecologic cancers and is the principal investigator of several clinical trials. She is also the Medical Director of the Database Mapping Research Project for the Madeline Franchi Ovarian Cancer Research Fund.
Marsha Moses, M.D.
Co-Director (Interim),
Vascular Biology Program
Department of Vascular Biology, Children's Hospital Boston
Dr. Moses is currently the Co-Director (Interim) of the Vascular Biology Program at Children's Hospital Boston. The Moses Lab has had a long-standing interest in identifying and characterizing the biochemical and molecular mechanisms underlying the regulation of angiogenesis during tumor progression, from the angiogenic switch through metastasis. Dr. Moses and her group have discovered five different angiogenesis inhibitors, three of which are in clinical development for use against a variety of cancers.
Significant efforts are now underway in the lab to identify the genes and proteins that they encode, that are responsible for the ''angiogenic switch.'' This critical checkpoint, during which time a tiny benign, avascular tumor acquires the vascular phenotype, is a prerequisite for subsequent tumor growth and progression. The Moses Lab has recently identified and validated a number of genes which are differentially expressed during the angiogenic switch and is currently developing molecular and biochemical interventions to prevent the switch from occurring by targeting some of these genes.
In addition, the Moses Lab has, as part of their long term Urinary Proteomics Initiative, developed a number of sensitive and specific non-invasive urine tests for different cancers. These cancer tests are based on the lab's work focused on the detection of biomarker proteins purified from the urine of cancer patients. A number of these urine tests are currently in clinical testing as potential cancer diagnostics and prognostics.
Mariana Castells, M.D.
Allergist-Immunologist, Division of Rheumatology, Immunology and Allergy
Brigham and Women's Hospital
Starting at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, MA,
Dr. Marianna Castells, an allergist-immunologist, has developed a life-saving process to desensitize ovarian cancer
patients who may become allergic to some of the chemotherapy drugs prescribed to them. Without the
ability to take these drugs, many patients would not
be able to seek any form of treatment. Dr. Castells’ research and clinical trials allow many women to become triumphant in their fight to overcome ovarian cancer.
Ronny Drapkin, M.D., Ph.D
Assistant Professor of Medicine
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Dr. Drapkin’s laboratory effort has focused on the biomarker HE4 (Human Epididymis protein 4). He has shown that this protein is both secreted by ovarian cancers and can be found in the blood of patients with ovarian cancer. Dr. Drapkin is addressing whether HE4 has other roles besides being a biomarker. There is preliminary data indicating that suppression of the HE4 protein in ovarian cancer cells (by a methodology called RNA interference) results in a decrease in the growth capacity of these tumor cells. These results suggest that HE4 may be playing an active role in ovarian cancer pathogenesis and/or progression and may be a novel therapeutic target.
Dr. Drapkin has shown that HE4 is expressed in the two major subtypes of ovarian cancer (serous and endometrioid carcinoma). Interestingly, HE4 is not expressed by other, more common, cancers such as breast, colon, thyroid, kidney and lung. Thus, it appears to be unique to ovarian cancer.
