A new institute at Penn’s Basser Center will use artificial intelligence and biomarkers to intercept hereditary cancers at their earliest stages, before they become disease.
The idea behind the gift is unusual enough to need its own word. Most cancer philanthropy funds treatment, the long campaign that begins once a tumour has announced itself.
Jon and Mindy Gray are funding something earlier, a discipline its champions call interception, which aims to stop hereditary cancers before they ever become disease.
Their $55 million has created the Basser Cancer Interception Institute at the University of Pennsylvania, and artificial intelligence sits close to the centre of how it intends to work.
The 💜 of EU techThe latest rumblings from the EU tech scene, a story from our wise ol' founder Boris, and some questionable AI art. It's free, every week, in your inbox. Sign up now!The institute grows out of the Grays’ long involvement with BRCA research. Mindy Gray’s sister, Faith Basser, died of ovarian cancer at 44, and the couple founded Penn’s Basser Center for BRCA in her memory, beginning with a $25 million gift and building, over the years, to commitments now well past $250 million across their philanthropy.
