Ellison Institute of Technology Insights Forum

Save the date for our next Insights Forum:

Thursday, December 5, 2024

Forum Topic: Will the evolution of cancer trump all of our approaches to stopping it?

Past Insights Forum Recordings

IS THE APPLICATION OF AI TO IMPROVE CANCER OUTCOMES TRANSFORMATIVE, OR IS EARLY OPTIMISM GIVING WAY TO CAUTION AND SKEPTICISM?

Sept. 2024
______

Our panel of experts revisit AI’s evolving role in cancer care. Why isn’t it delivering better patient diagnostics, treatments, and preventatives as expected? What’s holding it back, and how can we fix it?

YOU HAVE CANCER, WHAT’S NEXT? AS A PHYSICIAN (ONCOLOGIST), WHAT WOULD YOU DO – AND AS A PATIENT, WHAT SHOULD YOU DO – TO ENSURE YOU ARE DELIVERING/RECEIVING THE BEST CARE FOR THIS/YOUR SPECIFIC CANCER?

June 2024
______

Our panel of experts discuss how patients, advocates, and oncologists can collaborate to boost awareness and improve accessibility to cutting-edge cancer care.

WHAT ADVANCED TECHNOLOGIES WILL REVOLUTIONIZE MEDICAL RESEARCH AND CARE — AND WHY?

February 2024
______

Our panel of experts consider which advanced technologies have the potential to revolutionize the treatment and prevention of cancer and other complex diseases.

IS CANCER A DISEASE OF DYSFUNCTIONAL COMMUNICATION AND DYSREGULATED INFORMATION?

August 2023
______

Our panel of experts envision a future in which information theory is more broadly adopted in cancer research and consider the intriguing idea that cancer is, in reality, a disease of dysregulated information and dysfunctional communication.

WILL AI REVOLUTIONIZE CANCER TREATMENT, DIAGNOSIS, AND PREVENTION?

June 2023
______

Our experts explore the state of numerous efforts to apply AI to cancer, what to expect in terms of potential advances (or not) during the next decade and beyond, and what we should fear, if anything?

PROGRESS AGAINST THE MOST LETHAL CANCERS

February 2023
______

Why are improvements in survival not occurring in some of the most lethal cancers? Are advances in the molecular sciences and approaches, such as immunotherapy, that are driving precision medicine impacting death rates in metastatic cancers?

IMMUNOTHERAPHY

December 2022
______

If cancer immunotherapy is the answer to improving treatment or even curing or preventing most cancers, what are the research imperatives at this point? Are we doing enough to address these imperatives? If not, why not, and how can that be remedied?

WHAT ARE WE MISSING IN OUR 50-YEAR QUEST TO FUNDAMENTALLY UNDERSTAND & CONTROL CANCER

September 2022
______

Cancer is complex. It is a complex adaptive system, but is it irreducibly complex? If not, what are we missing that could enable progress? Our panel of experts explored this question and provided their insights.

PRECISION ONCOLOGY: SEPARATING HOPE FROM HYPE

May 2022
______

 Where, how, and why is precision oncology working predictably and well?
Where and why is precision oncology not working well – or at all?
What is needed for all cancer patients to have access to efficacious precision
oncology in the future?

EARLY CANCER DETECTION & PREVENTION:
THE NEW FRONTIER

February 2022
______

Are we on the cusp of a revolution in cancer? Is early detection of cancer the new frontier in cancer progression–or not? If so, what will be required (e.g., intervention strategies/technologies) to achieve needed changes in all sectors? If not, could very early detection of pre-cancer “signals” create unprecedented challenges?

INFORMATION THEORY

October 2021
______

If cancer is a dynamic information-driven complex adaptive system, what steps must be taken to shift from studying its “parts” vs. decoding and decrypting the information we need to identify and understand the flow of information and the logic of the system?

THE PHYSICS OF CANCER

July 2021
______

In the context of the convergence of the physical sciences with cancer biology, is research in the physical sciences clinically relevant? What will it take to advance promising areas of the physical sciences to solve critical questions in cancer that could lead to clinical breakthroughs?

DECONVOLUTING CANCER COMPLEXITY

May 2021
______

We are awash in data from cancer patients, but if data are not information, what and where is dysregulated cancer information, how do we collect it and is it critical for the diagnosis and treatment of cancer?

REVOLUTIONIZING CANCER TREATMENT THROUGH EVOLUTIONARY THEORY

March 2021
______

How could applying specific principles of evolution / evolutionary theory (and ecology) across biological and temporal scales of cancer revolutionize treatment strategies, reduce resistance, and improve patient outcomes?

PRECISION MEDICINE FOR COVID-19

January 2021
______

 Can we use the precision cancer medicine model to inform and improve the diagnosis and prevention of COVID-19 infections and treatment of the disease(s) it causes?