Two new grants from the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas bring the total of active CPRIT grants at UH to $11.1 million, and both are meant to develop new strategies to fight lung cancer.

Lao Saal, a cancer researcher at Lund University who survived leukaemia as a teenager and went on to develop a blood test – Pathlight – that can detect signs of breast cancer relapse a median of 13.7 months earlier than conventional methods, and in some cases up to three to four years earlier. The test works by identifying unique chromosomal rearrangements in tumour DNA circulating in the bloodstream (liquid biopsy). It launched in the US for breast and colon cancer, received Medicaid coverage in May 2025, and is already being used clinically. In 2016, Saal co-founded SAGA Diagnostics with PhD student Anthony George and LU Ventures, growing the company out of Lund Innovation District. The early years were lean, and a commercial path was far from guaranteed – an innovation scout from Lund University's office was the one who first pushed Saal to explore patenting and company formation. In spring 2026, Foundation Medicine (Roche) announced the acquisition of SAGA Diagnostics in a deal valued at up to USD 595 million. For Saal, the significance lies less in the sum than in what it enables: getting the technology to as many patients as possible.

Three commercially available radiology AI systems have shown the potential to flag early signs of breast cancer up to 6 years before a diagnosis, according to a new study.

Nanjing University researchers report a breakthrough siRNA delivery strategy that transforms the liver into a "biopharmaceutical factory" for targeted cancer therapy. The team developed an In Vivo Self-Assembled (IVSA) system that uses intravenously injected plasmid DNA to program hepatocytes to produce and package EGFR-targeting siRNA into GE11-tagged small extracellular vesicles. These "biomissiles" selectively deliver therapeutic siRNA to EGFR-positive tumors, overcoming the long-standing siRNA delivery challenge without complex in vitro encapsulation. The system demonstrated potent efficacy across EGFR-mutant lung cancer, gastric cancer, and breast cancer models, outperforming traditional targeted drugs while showing minimal off-target toxicity. This plug-and-play platform represents a paradigm shift from conventional drug manufacturing to in vivo biopharmaceutical production, offering a modular, cost-effective approach for personalized cancer gene therapy.