About the Investigator:

Dr. Shulman’s research focuses on understanding the mechanism of the immune response, with the goal of developing new ways to improve protective immunity from infectious disease and cancer.  He received his BSc degree from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, his PhD degree from the Weizmann Institute, and he was a postdoctoral fellow at the Rockefeller University in New York City.  He is currently a Senior Scientist (equivalent to an Assistant Professor in the US or Canada) in the Department of Immunology at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel.

About the Research:

Ovarian cancer is the gynecological malignancy that is most difficult to treat. Patients may be diagnosed at an advanced stage of disease, when current therapies are not as active as they are against early stage disease.  While the body mounts a robust immune response to ovarian cancer, efforts to develop therapies based on that response have so far been unsuccessful.

The goal of Dr. Shulman’s research is to develop new therapeutic approaches that leverage the robust immune response that occurs in patients with high-grade serous ovarian cancer (HGSC).  They examine the antibody immune response against the tumor in order to expose new targets on its surface and new naturally occurring therapeutic antibodies.  Dr. Shulman and his team will use mouse models to test whether patient-derived antibodies, generated in high-grade serous ovarian carcinoma (HGSC) tumors, can initiate an effective anti-tumor response.  They will characterize that response and the mechanisms that tumor cells may adopt to evade it in order to optimize this approach.  This antibody-based biological treatment will provide a much needed novel treatment for fighting ovarian cancer.