Video summary
The video introduces Dr. Danny Ingle, an assistant professor at the Salk Institute who specializes in the early detection and treatment of pancreatic cancer. With a background that includes degrees from Northwestern University and UC San Diego, as well as recent publications in *Cell Stem Cell*, she utilizes patient-derived pancreatic organoids to study disease progression and develop personalized therapies. Her journey into this specific field was deeply personal; after initially studying genetics, her focus shifted rapidly toward cancer research following the diagnosis of both her father and uncle with pancreatic cancer within a decade of each other. This family history provided her with a strong motivation to understand why such diseases are so difficult to treat and detect early enough to save lives.
Pancreatic cancer presents a unique challenge because it is relatively uncommon, with only about 60,000 new cases expected annually in the United States, yet it carries an extremely high mortality rate. The primary obstacle lies in screening; testing the general population for this condition is not considered cost-effective by insurance companies due to the low incidence of the disease compared to its severity. Furthermore, current diagnostic methods often yield false positives because pancreatitis and pancreatic cancer share very similar biomarkers but have vastly different outcomes. Distinguishing between these two conditions typically requires a biopsy rather than simple blood tests or CT scans, which is invasive and difficult for patients undergoing symptoms like stomach pain caused by tumors pressing on nerves or other organs.
The difficulty in early detection stems from the biological timeline of tumor growth within the pancreas. Mathematical modeling and autopsy studies indicate that it takes approximately 10 to 12 years for a pancreatic cancer lesion to form, yet this slow progression does not mean the disease is easy to catch; rather, patients usually do not experience symptoms until the tumor has grown large enough to cause physical pressure or pain. By the time these noticeable signs appear, there are already trillions of cancer cells in the body, and roughly 85% of patients have developed metastatic spread where the cancer has traveled to other parts of the body. Consequently, once a patient presents with symptoms indicating advanced disease, it is often too late for effective intervention, highlighting the critical need for better early detection platforms like organoids that Dr. Ingle's research aims to advance.
Read the full video transcript
our guest for the evening, Dr. Danny
Ingle.
Dr. Ingle is an assistant professor at
the Salk Institute specializing in the
early detection and treatment of
pancreatic cancer.
She received her BA from Northwestern
University in biology and Asian studies
and her PhD in biology from the
University of California, San Diego.
She recently
published a paper in Cell Stem Cell
describing a new platform using
patient-derived pancreatic organoids for
disease study and development of
personalized treatments.
And I think this sounds like a really
exciting direction. And I I we've talked
about organoids a lot on the show over
the years, but I think it's really
important to get somebody who's really
involved in the research and use of this
kind of a platform to come and talk with
us about how it works, the challenges,
all these things. Thank you for joining
me, Dr. Ingle.
>> Lovely to be here. Thanks for having me.
>> You're welcome. So,
first off,
before we get into this study and the
nut of uh of the nitty-gritty of
everything that you've been working on,
how did you actually come to start
studying pancreatic disorders in the
first place?
>> Uh so, I would say that my journey has
actually not been super typical for a
scientist. I actually went to college
for music uh before switching to biology
and a lot of that had to do with
with like, you know, using creative part
of my brain, but also figuring out that
while I might not be the best test
taker, I'm really good in the lab. And
so, for
>> [laughter]
>> for how I got into the pancreas, you
know, I I I started off working in
genetics, but then I uh I moved into
cancer pretty quickly because my dad was
diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. About
10 years later, my uncle was diagnosed
with pancreatic cancer. And so, for me,
it's been kind of a personal motivation
combined with this really scientific
drive to understand
why is it so hard to treat and find
early.
>> Why is it so hard?
>> [laughter]
>> I know, right? I mean, I wish I had all
the answers to that. I think that you
know, if you if you
zoom back out and you look at the
incidence of pancreatic cancer, it's
it's relatively uncommon. So, there'll
be about like 60 to 70,000 new cases
this year. Um and so, it's a low
incidence cancer, but it has a very high
mortality. And so, I think part of the
problem is that means that screening the
general population is not what insurance
companies would call cost-effective.
Um
which is a hard like you know, statistic
and and how you know, calculus for for
me to learn since I'm a patient
advocate, but at the same time, you
know, um
false positive do do harm.
And I think that's that's the big
challenge. And so, that's also how I got
started in pancreatitis because that's a
major false positive for any test that's
trying to detect pancreatic cancer. So,
they're two very similar diseases in
terms of their biomarkers, but their
outcomes are are very very different.
>> So, when somebody has is coming in with
stomach pains and has the the etiology,
the
the presentation
of certain aspects, it could be
pancreatitis or pancreatic can- cancer
and there's no way of knowing the
difference until you go into the
pancreas itself.
>> That's right. And so, in order to
confirm a diagnosis, it's not like you
know, a simple blood test or CT scan. It
it does require [clears throat] a biopsy
to really understand what what the
lesion is. And I think there's there's
multiple challenges here.
Um pancreatic cancer itself for
mathematical modeling and autopsy
studies takes 10 to 12 years to form.
So, it's not that it moves too fast for
us to find it. It's It's by the time
that there are symptoms, those symptoms
are usually caused because the tumor is
gotten big enough to impinge on on other
organs or you're starting to get um pain
that's from a a tumor pressing on a
nerve. And so I think at that point
there's already trillions of cancer
cells in your body and at that point 85%
of the patients already have metastatic
spread.
>> Oh, wow. So once it's there, it's it's
at a at a really late point.
>> Yeah.