UVA Comprehensive Cancer Center

11/15/2025

The Charlottesville Track Club recently presented a check for $80,000 raised by this year’s Cville Women's Four Miler to support UVA Health Breast Care Center patients as well as UVACCC research pursuing new, more effective treatments.

Club President Tim Wendel, Race Director Jaime Kurtz, PhD, along with Breast Care Center providers Christiana Brenin, MD, Trish Millard, MD, and Anneke Schroen, MD, MPH, (left to right) attended the presentation at Breast Care Center Pantops.

The Four Miler is the largest women's-only road race in Virginia. Since 1983, it has raised over $4.2 million supporting increased access to breast cancer screenings, personalized cancer care, and life-saving scientific advancements.

Thank you to the race organizers, participants, sponsors, volunteers and everyone who made this donation possible.

To learn more about the Charlottesville Women’s Four Miler, click here: https://runsignup.com/Race/VA/Charlottesville/CvilleWomens4Miler

To learn more about the UVA Breast Care Center, click here: https://uvahealth.com/locations/Breast-Care-Center-LOC0000234840

To learn about breast cancer treatment options at UVA Health, click here: https://bit.ly/41NswuD

11/14/2025

A shared calling to medical science brought Drs. Ilya and Kandice Levental together. Now, they’re not only partners in life, but in the fight against cancer and other deadly diseases. 🔬❤️

The pair met on their first day of graduate school, and four years later, were married. Then they decided to take the leap. “We figured that we have a complementary set of expertise, so we started the lab together 13 years ago now,” Ilya Levental said.

The Levental Lab combines molecular and cell biology, biophysics, biochemistry, and engineering to study how cells’ membrane and lipid interactions affect their functions to find drug targets for diseases like cancer. As part of their research work, Kandice performs lab experiments and mentors students, and Ilya shares their analyses and looks at big-picture questions with trainees.

Their lab became the first to show that protein condensates, structures that organize liquid inside cells called cytoplasm, help immune T cells detect and kill cancer by uniquely arranging diseased cells’ membranes.

With support from the Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), the Leventals’ membrane biophysics, protein condensate, and cancer immunology research could improve chimeric antigen receptors, or CARs — T cells modified to target specific viruses or cancer, helping them attack tumors. “This wasn't actually known when these first-generation and second-generation CAR T cells were being made,” Ilya Levental said. “That knowledge simply didn't exist until our story.”

To learn more about research in the Levental Lab, click here: http://www.levental-lab.com/

To read more about the Leventals’ scientific partnership, click here: https://research.virginia.edu/news/how-scientific-partnership-illuminates-cancer-immunotherapy

To watch the Levental’s ‘Research in Motion’ video, click here:
https://med.virginia.edu/bims/research-in-motion-ilya-levental-phd-and-kandace-levental-phd/

11/14/2025

11/13/2025

UVA Health and UVA Comprehensive Cancer Center have been recognized by Becker's Hospital Review on its 2025 list of 100 hospitals and health systems with great oncology programs.

Becker’s described the center – Virginia’s first National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center and one of just 57 in America – as a “nationally recognized leader in cancer care, research and prevention” that combines “holistic care with world-class innovation.”

🏆 Read more at https://bit.ly/3LHjJ88

11/13/2025

11/12/2025

UVA Health celebrated Lung Cancer Awareness Month this past Saturday by welcoming Susan Radlinski and Nancy Hankinson to the field.

Susan Radlinski is a lifelong runner and scuba diver who was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2024. Susan had no symptoms of cancer, so her diagnosis was a complete surprise. She completed treatment this past spring, receiving what she calls “phenomenal care” from her UVA Health team, and was recently officially declared cancer-free.

Nancy Hankinson was successfully treated for breast cancer over 25 years ago. Recently, a routine scan after shoulder surgery showed she once again had cancer, in both her breasts and lungs. Luckily, both were caught early. Nancy had treatment, including robotic lung surgery, at UVA Health, and today she’s once again cancer-free.

Susan and Nancy are joined by their families, as well as Dr. Mitch Rosner, CEO of UVA Health; Dr. Colin Derdeyn, interim dean of the UVA School of Medicine; and members of the UVA Health lung cancer team: surgeon Dr. Linda Martin; oncologists Dr. Richard Hall and Dr. Ryan Gentzler; pulmonologists Dr. Ellen Volker and Dr. Subodh Pandey; and nurse practitioner Aimee Strong.

11/10/2025

💙 This November, we honor the fighters, the families, and the unseen strength behind every story.

It’s Lung, Pancreatic, Stomach, Carcinoid, and Neuroendocrine Cancer Awareness Month — a time to pause, reflect, and stand alongside everyone whose life has been touched by these diseases.

At UVA Comprehensive Cancer Center, we know that cancer care is more than medicine — it’s about listening deeply, meeting people where they are, and walking with them every step of the way. From early detection and advanced therapies to nutrition, emotional support, and survivorship programs, our team is here to care for the whole person — body, mind, and spirit.

💬 Whether you’re navigating a diagnosis, supporting a loved one, or honoring someone’s memory, you’re part of a community that truly understands.

🕊️ Hope. Healing. Humanity. That’s what drives us — today and every day.

11/08/2025

Matthew Devall, PhD, has been awarded a prestigious National Institutes of Health (NIH) National Cancer Institute K22 Transition Career Development Award, which will support his work to pinpoint genetic factors in colorectal cancer and provide a launchpad for future research.

A School of Medicine at the University of Virginia researcher since 2018 and a Cancer Center member since 2023, this year Dr. Devall was appointed a tenure-track Assistant Professor of Family Medicine and is establishing his own lab.
Using tissue models made from healthy cells, gene editing and high-resolution imaging, Dr. Devall aims to confirm how variation within the healthy human genome can alter colorectal cancer risk. The grant will also support the training opportunities for Dr. Devall in artificial intelligence to aid this and future projects.
Dr. Devall hopes his work will identify telltale biomarkers of colorectal cancer and disease risk, as well as targets for future treatments.

Congratulations, Dr. Devall, and good luck!!🥳

To learn more about Dr. Devall and other UVA National Institutes of Health “K” awardees, click here: https://news.med.virginia.edu/research/three-school-of-medicine-researchers-receive-prestigious-nih-k-awards/

11/07/2025

Biomedical engineer Richard Price, PhD, who co-leads UVACCC’s cancer therapeutics research program and the UVA Focused Ultrasound Immuno-Oncology (FUSION) Center, was recently featured by media outlets including the BBC and The Independent, addressing focused ultrasound’s emergence as a promising new cancer therapy.

Ultrasound — sound waves beyond the range of human hearing traditionally used for imaging — is already being used to treat cancer and other serious illnesses noninvasively. School of Medicine at the University of Virginia researchers led its development for treatment of essential tremor and Parkinson’s disease, and UVA Health was the first system in Virginia to offer histotripsy, a focused-ultrasound procedure for treating liver tumors.

Speaking to the BBC, and in an article he wrote for The Conversation US republished by The Independent and other outlets, Dr. Price described focused ultrasound’s ability to breach the physical barrier between the blood system and the brain, opening a potential pathway for drugs to treat brain cancers and Alzheimer’s disease.

Targeting tumors with focused ultrasound has also been shown to trigger the immune system’s natural response to fight cancer, a response that can be boosted using immunotherapy drugs. UVA researchers are conducting multiple trials evaluating these combination treatments for breast cancer, glioblastoma – an aggressive and deadly form of brain cancer – and advanced melanoma.

“With further research and advancements, I am hopeful that focused ultrasound can become a viable treatment option for many devastating rare diseases,” Dr. Price wrote.

To read the BBC’s article about focused ultrasound, click here: https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20251007-how-ultrasound-is-ushering-a-new-era-of-surgery-free-cancer-treatment

To read Dr. Price’s article for The Conversation, click here:
https://theconversation.com/focused-sound-energy-holds-promise-for-treating-cancer-alzheimers-and-other-diseases-262622

To learn more about Dr. Price’s research, click here:
https://engineering.virginia.edu/faculty/richard-j-price

To learn more about UVA’s Focused Ultrasound Immuno-Oncology Center (FUSION), click here:
https://med.virginia.edu/uva-focused-ultrasound-cancer-immunotherapy-center/

For information about clinical trials at UVACCC, click here:
https://uvahealth.com/services/cancer/cancer-clinical-trials

11/01/2025

Jeffrey Smith, PhD, and his lab team were recently awarded a five-year, $2.6 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH)’s National Institute on Aging - NIH to study how aging drives diseases, including diabetes, heart disease, neurodegenerative conditions, and cancer.

Using baker’s yeast cells as a model, Dr. Smith’s lab studies how DNA-repair mechanisms deteriorate over time, accelerating aging and increasing disease risk. In this new project, his team will investigate how yeast cells counter that instability – and look for similar processes in human cells – in the hope of identifying new opportunities for disease prevention and treatment.

Congratulations to Dr. Smith and his team! 🎉

To read more about Dr. Smith’s grant award, click here: https://news.med.virginia.edu/research/jeff-smith-phd-awarded-2-61-million-to-study-aging-and-its-impact-on-chronic-diseases/

To learn more about Dr. Smith’s research, click here: https://med.virginia.edu/bmg/research/smith-lab/

10/31/2025

Urologic oncologist Tracey Krupski, MD, MPH, was the UVA investigator who led the clinical trials that helped get the new gene therapy intravesical nadofaragene firadenovec, known as Adstiladrin, U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved for non-muscle invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC), offering hope for long-term management of the disease without invasive surgeries.

UVA Health was the first in Virginia to offer Adstiladrin, a medication carrying the therapeutic gene interferon alpha 2B (IFNa2b). IFNa2b instructs bladder cells to send signals triggering the immune system to block tumor growth and kill cancer cells. To date, the therapy has led to no tumor recurrence in 40 percent of clinical trial participants.

NMIBC is commonly treated using the immunotherapy Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) or intravesical chemotherapy, but if those treatments fail, surgical removal of the bladder is recommended. Adstiladrin allows patients to keep their bladder and provides a “more user-friendly option for patients who struggle with frequent hospital visits and want to avoid major surgeries,” Dr. Krupski said.

To learn more about Adstiladrin, click here: https://www.uvaphysicianresource.com/bladder-cancer-gene-therapy/

To learn more about Dr. Krupski’s research, click here: https://uvahealth.com/findadoctor/Tracey-Krupski-1659455715

10/30/2025

Live in southwest Virginia? The Southwest Virginia Cancer Advisory Board, led by UVA Comprehensive Cancer Center, is seeking input from local cancer survivors, caregivers, healthcare professionals, and others passionate about improving cancer outcomes.
📣 Find out how you can help: https://bit.ly/4oGm0P1

Live in southwest Virginia? The Southwest Virginia Cancer Advisory Board, led by UVA Comprehensive Cancer Center, is seeking input from local cancer survivors, caregivers, healthcare professionals, and others passionate about improving cancer outcomes.

📣 Find out how you can help: https://bit.ly/4oGm0P1