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Our Blog
Writer: Co-Founder Dr. Robert A. Nagourney, MD May 30, 2025 1 min read
Dr. Nagourney Attends the Collaboration Circle Live Event in Hudson Valley, New York
On May13, Dr. Nagourney traveled to Hudson Valley in Upstate New York to participate in a 2-day symposium exploring new directions in health, wellness and global healthcare. The conference, organized by the Collaboration Circle, brought together prominent figures in international finance with some of the most innovative researchers.
Among the speakers was Baroness Susan Greenfield, a neuroscientist from Oxford who discussed her research in cognitive function, memory, aging and dementia. Also presenting was Kneeland Youngblood, MD, physician, business man and political figure who described American medical policy and new technologies. The event turned to personalized health as Jeff Halevy from Continuum described advances in personalized fitness.
Dr. Anna Mandinova, MD, PhD from Harvard University and the Broad Institute described breakthroughs in skin health and rejuvenation including stem cell applications.
Dr. Nagourney then presented a discussion on human longevity arising from his work on metabolism. He explained that his exploration of cancer metabolism reported in a series of peer-reviewed publications and the subject of 3 presentations at this week’s ASCO meeting in Chicago has led to the realization that cancer shares metabolic features with a broad array of human illnesses. As he explained, cancer may be a weigh-station along a continuum of human illnesses from diabetes and cardiovascular disease to cancer and dementia.
Using quantitative mass spectrometry, Dr. Nagourney’s laboratory is now actively engaged in the exploration of human health using the measurement of metabolites in the blood to identify individuals at risk for disease. These metabolic platforms can measure the most fundamental features of health, wellness and provide insights into longevity.
The event was a diverse mixture of scientists, clinical investigators, AI experts, entrepreneurs and investors and provided a unique opportunity for those who are forging new directions in health and medicine to meet with those who can sponsor and support those breakthroughs.
Writer: Co-Founder Dr. Robert A. Nagourney, MD Mar 4, 2024 2 min read
Breakthrough in Pancreatic Cancer: New Blood Test for Early Detection, Could Offer Improved Therapy
As we report in the February issue of the journal Metabolites, we have shown, for the first time that pancreatic cancer arises through changes in cellular metabolism, and that these changes can be measured with a simple blood test.
The results offer a new pancreatic cancer diagnostic test that can find the cancer earlier than tumor markers or radiographic measures and lead to more judicious use of therapy.
By comparison, genomic tests of DNA for early detection suffer from false positives and false negatives. Even in patients at the highest risk of pancreatic cancer by genomic markers, like BRCA2 and PALB2 mutations, endoscopy and MRI screening proved ineffective as was very recently reported by investigators in Boston, (Peters, MLB, J. Clin. Oncol., volume 20 #2, pp278-290, 2024).
Pancreatic cancer is the third leading cause of death from cancer largely because it is almost never caught early. The ability of our blood test to find the disease in its earliest stages, while still curable, could have a major impact on our patients.
Beyond finding the disease earlier than other approaches, our blood metabolic test predicted patient survival. This is unique to our test as genetic DNA tests have absolutely no ability to predict survival.
For over a century, scientists have been trying to connect cancer to cellular energy production and metabolism. But it wasn’t until the development of Quantitative Mass Spectrometry that we could test many of these hypotheses.
Using Mass Spectrometry to measure minute concentrations of bio-chemicals in the plasma, our test identified pancreatic cancer with nearly perfect accuracy.
Our published findings point to an entirely new direction in pancreatic cancer research. Moving beyond genomics and DNA analyses, this research defines pancreatic cancer as a biochemical disorder. As we show, changes in amino acids, blood sugars and lipids, define cancer as a state of metabolic stress.
For the first time, blood concentrations of metabolic byproducts can be accurately measured in real time. This is enabling our team to use highly discriminating ratios that pit amino acids, the building blocks of proteins, against lipids including triglycerides and sugars like glucose.
The results offer a “cancer signature” that distinguishes patients with pancreatic cancer from normal individuals and also distinguishes pancreatic cancer from other forms of cancer, like breast and ovarian.
Pancreatic cancers establish a new set of rules for making and using energy that propels these malignant tumors to succeed, all at the expense of the cancer patient’s wellbeing.
There is a critical need for better diagnostic and prognostic tests in this highly lethal. Metabolic analyses may be the key to earlier diagnosis and better management.
Our CLIA licensed laboratory is conducting these metabolic tests for our patients who are seen in consultation for pancreatic cancer. We will draw the blood on-site during consultation for the laboratory test.
Writer: Co-Founder Dr. Robert A. Nagourney, MD Dec 30, 2022 2 min read
A Year-End Reflection
2022 has nearly ended and I take a moment to reflect.
Among our most important accomplishments in 2022 was the installation of a world-class Mass Spectrometry research program, replete with a clean room, technical support, and a thousand plasma samples processed on-site to date.
Our laboratory’s long-standing focus on cancer biology at the level of cellular function, known
scientifically as the cell phenotype (not to be confused with DNA profiles conducted at most centers known as cell genotype) led seamlessly to our interest in the most profound measure of cell function, cancer metabolism.
Our first formal study examined 1225 individuals to identify metabolic signatures for breast cancer as we published (DaSilva, I et al Oncotarget, 2018). Our next study examined the relationship between drug response and cell metabolism in advanced ovarian cancer. Not only did we predict clinical resistance to platinum-based chemotherapy using our EVA/PCD platform but also showed that drug resistance could be predicted by measuring metabolites in the blood (D’Amora, P. et al Gynecologic Oncology, 2021).
To further connect cellular drug resistance with metabolism we conducted a unique study. Since our laboratory already conducts cancer cell cultures in a blood-like media, leaving them to consume nutrients and give off byproducts, we decided to actually measure what these cancer cells were eating and making by extracting the culture media and running our mass spectrometry metabolic profiles.
As we reported at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) the cancer cells left behind unique signatures in their micro-environment that predicted which patients would achieve complete remission and be cured with chemotherapy. These rather striking results showed that each cancer patient’s outcome is driven by their cancer cell’s energy production. The cancer micro-environment predicts each patient’s survival, all within a week of diagnosis (Nagourney A, Proc AACR, April 2022).
Extending this work into the realm of infectious disease we were able to predict which patients with COVID-19 would suffer severe complications or death. In a study of 131 individuals, metabolic signatures from the blood in newly diagnosed patients with COVID-19, cut across all other categories like age, obesity, and cardiovascular disease to identify the people at the greatest risk from the infection as we reported (D’Amora, P et al PlosOne, December 2021). This was also the subject of a CBS News story that aired on December 9, 2021.
The implications of these findings can hardly be overstated. Here in 2022, we are on the verge of an entirely new understating of human disease. Combining these tests with our cancer culture techniques offers a heretofore unknown level of rigor. Indeed, these tests may enable us to detect cancers years, even decades before any signs or symptoms arise. Moreover, these metabolic studies may provide insights into all human maladies as we begin to see broad commonalities that cut across all medical diagnoses.
2023 could prove to be the year that cancer medicine steps beyond gene profiles and DNA tests to an era of truly personalized care. Welcome to the future of modern medicine.