Abstract

Microfluidics for Assessing Breast Cancer Susceptibility

Lydia Sohn, Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of California, Berkeley

More than 75% of women with newly diagnosed breast cancer are over the age of 50.  Women who carry germline mutations have a lifetime risk as high 80% for developing breast cancer.  Microfluidic applications in breast cancer have focused on diagnosis and therapeutic screening, and more recently, on recapitulating tumor microenvironments to study breast cancer biology.  In this talk, I will describe how my lab has taken a different path:  using microfluidics to assess a woman’s susceptibility for developing breast cancer.