2026-27 Team Science Grantees: Gottfried Konecny, MD & Jillian Phallen, PhD

About Project

Cell-free DNA fragmentomes and protein biomarkers for early detection of ovarian cancer: Discovering biology, creating improved classifiers, and establishing logistics for clinical trial to validate liquid biopsy multi-analyte test for ovarian cancer screening

PROJECT SUMMARY

Purpose of the Study: Ovarian cancer releases genetic material (DNA) into the bloodstream early in its development. By studying DNA fragments in blood, we hope to find a reliable way to spot the disease sooner, when it is much easier to treat and cure. Our research team will compare DNA found in the blood of women with ovarian cancer, with harmless ovarian growths, and healthy women. We plan to explore whether adding more biological markers to our test can make it even better, and build a network of hospitals and clinics to help collect
blood samples from women both with and without ovarian cancer.

Why This Matters: Ovarian cancer is one of the deadliest cancers for women, mostly because it is found too late. When diagnosed early (stage I), up to 90% of patients can be cured with standard treatment. Unfortunately, only about 15% of ovarian cancers are caught this early, and there’s no effective routine screening test.

What We’ve Done So Far: We developed DELFI-Pro. This test looks at DNA fragments found in blood, along with two protein markers (CA-125 and HE4). We found that DELFI-Pro was able to detect ovarian cancer with very high accuracy—even for early-stage disease. Now, we are getting ready to launch a larger study to further test and validate DELFI-Pro.

Why This Could Change Lives: If successful, our blood test could become a safe, easy, and widely available tool for early detection of ovarian cancer and we could dramatically reduce the number of women who die from ovarian cancer.