Eliyas Asfaw
Pronouns: He/Him/His
UROP Fellowship: Biomedical and Life Sciences
Research Mentor(s): Yongqun Oliver He, PhD
Unit for Laboratory Animal Medicine, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Center for Computational Medicine and Bioinformatics, and Comprehensive Cancer Center, University of Michigan Medical School
Presentation Date: Tuesday, July 28, 2020 | Session 1 | Presenter: 7
Authors: Chloe Darancou, Eliyas Asfaw, Yongqun Oliver He
Abstract
Cancer is the second leading cause of death in the United States and has become a global public health problem. Cancer is the abnormal or uncontrolled growth of cells in the body caused by mutations of DNA within cells. In many cases cancer is characterized by the growth of a tumor within the body; however, in cancers such as Leukemias, a tumor is necessarily present. In recent years, there have been extensive studies experimenting with the concept of cancer vaccines. Cancer vaccines can either be used to prevent or treat cancer through the injection of antigens or cancer cells that can stimulate a beneficial immune response in a patient. One of the more commonly known cancer vaccines is the HPV vaccine which is used to prevent the infection of HPV, thus preventing primarily cervical cancers. The primary goal in this project is to compile a database, CanVaxKB, that lists cancer vaccines that have been tested or are currently being tested, in order to expand the spread of information regarding these vaccines and cancer research as a whole. CanVaxKB includes information regarding the genes of the antigens/cells presented in the vaccine while discussing clinical trials associated with each vaccine. This database allows for a thorough explanation of treatments for a certain type of cancer by enabling a user to compare two or more vaccines. Furthermore, from this database and compilation of vaccines, we are able to utilize ontology and discover relationships between cancer vaccines to further our understanding and highlight the best approaches to make them.
Google Slide Presentation
Presentation Script
Research Disciplines
Biomedical Sciences, Interdisciplinary, Natural Sciences, Life Sciences
