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TED Talks, Jack Andraka: A promising test for pancreatic cancer ... from a teenager

Jack Andraka: A promising test for pancreatic cancer ... from a teenager

Have you ever experienced a moment in your life that was so painful and confusing that all you wanted to do was learn as much as you could to make sense of it all?

When I was 13, a close family friend who was like an uncle to me passed away from pancreatic cancer. When the disease hit so close to home, I knew I needed to learn more, so I went online to find answers.

Using the Internet, I found a variety of statistics on pancreatic cancer, and what I had found shocked me. Over 85 percent of all pancreatic cancers are diagnosed late, when someone has less than a two percent chance of survival. Why are we so bad at detecting pancreatic cancer? The reason? Today's current modern medicine is a 60-year-old technique. That's older than my dad.

(Laughter)

But also, it's extremely expensive, costing 800 dollars per test, and it's grossly inaccurate, missing 30 percent of all pancreatic cancers. Your doctor would have to be ridiculously suspicious that you have the cancer in order to give you this test. Learning this, I knew there had to be a better way. So I set up a scientific criteria as to what a sensor would have to look like in order to effectively diagnose pancreatic cancer. The sensor would have to be inexpensive, rapid, simple, sensitive, selective, and minimally invasive.

Now, there's a reason why this test hasn't been updated in over six decades, and that's because, when we're looking for pancreatic cancer, we're looking at your bloodstream, which is already abundant in all these tons and tons of protein, and you're looking for this miniscule difference in this tiny amount of protein, just this one protein. That's next to impossible.

However, undeterred due to my teenage optimism -- (Applause) — I went online to a teenager's two best friends, Google and Wikipedia. I got everything for my homework from those two sources. And what I had found was an article that listed a database of over 8,000 different proteins that are found when you have pancreatic cancer. So I decided to go and make it my new mission to go through all these proteins and see which ones could serve as a biomarker for pancreatic cancer. And to make it a bit simpler for myself, I decided to map out a scientific criteria. And here it is. Essentially first, the protein would have to be found in all pancreatic cancers at high levels in the bloodstream in the earliest stages, but also only in cancer.

And so I'm just plugging and chugging through this gargantuan task, and finally, on the 4,000th try, when I'm close to losing my sanity, I find the protein. And the name of the protein I'd located was called mesothelin, and it's just your ordinary, run-of-the-mill type protein, unless of course you have pancreatic, ovarian or lung cancer, in which case it's found at these very high levels in your bloodstream. But also the key is that it's found in the earliest stages of the disease, when someone has close to 100 percent chance of survival.

So now that I'd found a reliable protein I could detect, I then shifted my focus to actually detecting that protein, and, thus, pancreatic cancer. Now, my breakthrough came in a very unlikely place, possibly the most unlikely place for innovation: my high school biology class, the absolute stifler of innovation.

(Laughter) (Applause)

And I had snuck in this article on these things called carbon nanotubes, and that's just a long, thin pipe of carbon that's an atom thick and one 50 thousandth the diameter of your hair. And despite their extremely small sizes, they have these incredible properties. They're kind of like the superheroes of material science. And while I was sneakily reading this article under my desk in my biology class, we were supposed to be paying attention to these other kind of cool molecules called antibodies. And these are pretty cool because they only react with one specific protein, but they're not nearly as interesting as carbon nanotubes. And so then, I was sitting in class, and suddenly it hit me: I could combine what I was reading about, carbon nanotubes, with what I was supposed to be thinking about, antibodies. Essentially, I could weave a bunch of these antibodies into a network of carbon nanotubes such that you have a network that only reacts with one protein, but also, due to the properties of these nanotubes, it would change its electrical properties based on the amount of protein present.

However, there's a catch. These networks of carbon nanotubes are extremely flimsy, and since they're so delicate, they need to be supported. So that's why I chose to use paper. Making a cancer sensor out of paper is about as simple as making chocolate chip cookies, which I love. You start with some water, pour in some nanotubes, add antibodies, mix it up, take some paper, dip it, dry it, and you can detect cancer.

(Applause)

Then, suddenly, a thought occurred that kind of put a blemish on my amazing plan here. I can't really do cancer research on my kitchen countertop. My mom wouldn't really like that. So instead, I decided to go for a lab. So I typed up a budget, a materials list, a timeline, and a procedure, and I emailed it to 200 different professors at Johns Hopkins University and the National Institutes of Health, essentially anyone that had anything to do with pancreatic cancer. And I sat back waiting for these positive emails to be pouring in, saying, "You're a genius! You're going to save us all!" And — (Laughter)

Then reality took hold, and over the course of a month, I got 199 rejections out of those 200 emails. One professor even went through my entire procedure, painstakingly -- I'm not really sure where he got all this time -- and he went through and said why each and every step was like the worst mistake I could ever make. Clearly, the professors did not have as high of an opinion of my work as I did.

However, there was a silver lining. One professor said, "Maybe I might be able to help you, kid." So I went in that direction.

(Laughter)

As you can never say no to a kid.

And so then, three months later, I finally nailed down a harsh deadline with this guy, and I get into his lab, I get all excited, and then I sit down, I start opening my mouth and talking, and five seconds later he calls in another Ph.D. Ph.D. 's just flock into this little room, and they're just firing these questions at me, and by the end, I kind of felt like I was in a clown car. There were 20 Ph.D. 's plus me and the professor crammed into this tiny office space with them firing these rapid-fire questions at me, trying to sink my procedure. How unlikely is that? I mean, pshhh.

(Laughter)

However, subjecting myself to that interrogation, I answered all of their questions, and I guessed on quite a few but I got them right, and I finally landed the lab space I needed.

But it was shortly afterwards that I discovered my once brilliant procedure had something like a million holes in it, and over the course of seven months, I painstakingly filled each and every one of those holes.

The result? One small paper sensor that costs three cents and takes five minutes to run. This makes it 168 times faster, over 26,000 times less expensive, and over 400 times more sensitive than our current standard for pancreatic cancer detection.

(Applause)

One of the best parts of the sensor, though, is that it has close to 100 percent accuracy, and can detect the cancer in the earliest stages when someone has close to 100 percent chance of survival. And so in the next two to five years, this sensor could potentially lift for pancreatic cancer survival rates from a dismal 5.5 percent to close to 100 percent, and it would do similar for ovarian and lung cancer.

But it wouldn't stop there. By switching out that antibody, you can look at a different protein, thus, a different disease, potentially any disease in the entire world. So that ranges from heart disease to malaria, HIV, AIDS, as well as other forms of cancer -- anything.

And so hopefully one day we can all have that one extra uncle, that one mother, that one brother, sister, we can have that one more family member to love, and that our hearts will be rid of that one disease burden that comes from pancreatic, ovarian and lung cancer, and potentially any disease, that through the Internet anything is possible. Theories can be shared, and you don't have to be a professor with multiple degrees to have your ideas valued. It's a neutral space, where what you look like, age or gender, it doesn't matter. It's just your ideas that count. For me, it's all about looking at the Internet in an entirely new way to realize that there's so much more to it than just posting duck-face pictures of yourself online. You could be changing the world.

So if a 15-year-old who didn't even know what a pancreas was could find a new way to detect pancreatic cancer, just imagine what you could do.

Thank you.

(Applause)

Jack Andraka: A promising test for pancreatic cancer ... from a teenager Jack Andraka: Ein vielversprechender Test für Bauchspeicheldrüsenkrebs ... von einem Teenager Jack Andraka: Una prueba prometedora para el cáncer de páncreas ... de un adolescente Jack Andraka : Un test prometteur pour le cancer du pancréas, réalisé par un adolescent Jack Andraka: Un test promettente per il cancro al pancreas ... da un adolescente ジャック・アンドラカ氏膵臓癌の有望な検査法...10代の若者から 잭 안드라카 췌장암에 대한 유망한 검사... 십대부터 시작되었습니다. Jack Andraka: Een veelbelovende test voor alvleesklierkanker ... van een tiener Jack Andraka: Obiecujący test na raka trzustki... od nastolatka Jack Andraka: Um teste promissor para o cancro do pâncreas ... de um adolescente Джек Андрака: Многообещающий тест на рак поджелудочной железы... от подростка Jack Andraka: Pankreas kanseri için umut verici bir test... bir gençten Джек Андрака: Багатообіцяючий тест на рак підшлункової залози... від підлітка 杰克·安德拉卡(Jack Andraka):一项有希望的胰腺癌测试......来自青少年 傑克·安德拉卡(Jack Andraka):一項有希望的胰腺癌測試......來自青少年

Have you ever experienced a moment in your life that was so painful and confusing that all you wanted to do was learn as much as you could to make sense of it all? あなたの人生の中で、あなたがやりたいことすべてが、それをすべて理解するためにできるだけ多く学ぶことであるほどに苦痛で混乱した瞬間を経験したことがありますか? 您是否曾经历过生命中如此痛苦和困惑的时刻,以至于您想要做的就是尽可能多地学习以理解这一切?

When I was 13, a close family friend who was like an uncle to me passed away from pancreatic cancer. 私が13歳のとき、叔父のような親しい家族の友人が膵臓癌から亡くなりました。 When the disease hit so close to home, I knew I needed to learn more, so I went online to find answers.

Using the Internet, I found a variety of statistics on pancreatic cancer, and what I had found shocked me. Over 85 percent of all pancreatic cancers are diagnosed late, when someone has less than a two percent chance of survival. Why are we so bad at detecting pancreatic cancer? The reason? Today’s current modern medicine is a 60-year-old technique. 今日の現在の現代医学は60年前の技術です。 That’s older than my dad.

(Laughter)

But also, it’s extremely expensive, costing 800 dollars per test, and it’s grossly inaccurate, missing 30 percent of all pancreatic cancers. Your doctor would have to be ridiculously suspicious that you have the cancer in order to give you this test. Learning this, I knew there had to be a better way. So I set up a scientific criteria as to what a sensor would have to look like in order to effectively diagnose pancreatic cancer. そこで、膵臓癌を効果的に診断するためにセンサーがどのように見える必要があるかについて、科学的基準を設定しました。 The sensor would have to be inexpensive, rapid, simple, sensitive, selective, and minimally invasive. センサーは、安価で、迅速で、シンプルで、感度が高く、選択的で、侵襲性が最小限でなければなりません。

Now, there’s a reason why this test hasn’t been updated in over six decades, and that’s because, when we’re looking for pancreatic cancer, we’re looking at your bloodstream, which is already abundant in all these tons and tons of protein, and you’re looking for this miniscule difference in this tiny amount of protein, just this one protein. さて、このテストが60年以上更新されていないのには理由があります。それは、私たちが膵臓癌を探しているとき、これらのすべてのトンですでに豊富にあるあなたの血流を見ているからです。たんぱく質、このわずかなたんぱく質、このたった1つのたんぱく質におけるこのごくわずかな違いを探しています。 That’s next to impossible.

However, undeterred due to my teenage optimism -- (Applause) — I went online to a teenager’s two best friends, Google and Wikipedia. I got everything for my homework from those two sources. And what I had found was an article that listed a database of over 8,000 different proteins that are found when you have pancreatic cancer. So I decided to go and make it my new mission to go through all these proteins and see which ones could serve as a biomarker for pancreatic cancer. And to make it a bit simpler for myself, I decided to map out a scientific criteria. そして、私にとってそれを少し簡単にするために、私は科学的基準を作成することにしました。 And here it is. そしてここにあります。 Essentially first, the protein would have to be found in all pancreatic cancers at high levels in the bloodstream in the earliest stages, but also only in cancer. 本質的に最初に、タンパク質はすべての膵臓癌で最も早い段階で血流中に高レベルで見つかる必要がありますが、癌にも見られる必要があります。

And so I’m just plugging and chugging through this gargantuan task, and finally, on the 4,000th try, when I’m close to losing my sanity, I find the protein. そして、私はこの巨大なタスクをプラグインしてチャグリングしているだけです。そして最後に、4,000回目の試行で、正気を失いかけそうになったときに、タンパク質を見つけます。 And the name of the protein I’d located was called mesothelin, and it’s just your ordinary, run-of-the-mill type protein, unless of course you have pancreatic, ovarian or lung cancer, in which case it’s found at these very high levels in your bloodstream. そして、私が見つけたタンパク質の名前はメソセリンと呼ばれていました、そしてもちろんあなたが普通の普通のタイプのタンパク質です、もちろんあなたが膵臓、卵巣、または肺癌を持っていない限り、それはこれらの非常に見つけられますあなたの血流の高レベル。 But also the key is that it’s found in the earliest stages of the disease, when someone has close to 100 percent chance of survival. しかし、重要なのは、それが病気の初期段階で発見されるということです。誰かの生存率が100%に近い場合です。

So now that I’d found a reliable protein I could detect, I then shifted my focus to actually detecting that protein, and, thus, pancreatic cancer. 検出できる信頼できるタンパク質が見つかったので、焦点を実際のタンパク質、つまり膵臓癌の検出に移しました。 Now, my breakthrough came in a very unlikely place, possibly the most unlikely place for innovation: my high school biology class, the absolute stifler of innovation. さて、私の画期的な出来事は、非常にありそうもない場所、おそらくイノベーションの最もありそうもない場所で起こりました。私の高校の生物学のクラス、イノベーションの絶対的な抑圧者です。

(Laughter) (Applause)

And I had snuck in this article on these things called carbon nanotubes, and that’s just a long, thin pipe of carbon that’s an atom thick and one 50 thousandth the diameter of your hair. そして、私はカーボンナノチューブと呼ばれるこれらのものについてこの記事を読みましたが、これは、原子の厚さと髪の毛の直径の1万分の1である、長くて薄いカーボンのパイプです。 And despite their extremely small sizes, they have these incredible properties. そして、それらは非常に小さいサイズにもかかわらず、これらの驚くべき特性を持っています。 They’re kind of like the superheroes of material science. それらは材料科学のスーパーヒーローのようなものです。 And while I was sneakily reading this article under my desk in my biology class, we were supposed to be paying attention to these other kind of cool molecules called antibodies. そして、私が生物学のクラスの私の机の下でこっそりこの記事を読んでいる間、私たちは抗体と呼ばれるこれらの他の種類のクールな分子に注意を払っていたはずです。 And these are pretty cool because they only react with one specific protein, but they’re not nearly as interesting as carbon nanotubes. そして、これらは1つの特定のタンパク質とのみ反応するのでかなりクールですが、カーボンナノチューブほど興味深いものではありません。 And so then, I was sitting in class, and suddenly it hit me: I could combine what I was reading about, carbon nanotubes, with what I was supposed to be thinking about, antibodies. それで、私は授業中に座っていたとき、突然それを感じました。私が読んでいたカーボンナノチューブと、私が考えているはずの抗体とを組み合わせることができました。 Essentially, I could weave a bunch of these antibodies into a network of carbon nanotubes such that you have a network that only reacts with one protein, but also, due to the properties of these nanotubes, it would change its electrical properties based on the amount of protein present. 基本的に、これらの抗体の束をカーボンナノチューブのネットワークに織り込み、1つのタンパク質とのみ反応するネットワークを作成できますが、これらのナノチューブの特性により、量に基づいて電気的特性が変化します存在するタンパク質の。

However, there’s a catch. ただし、落とし穴があります。 These networks of carbon nanotubes are extremely flimsy, and since they’re so delicate, they need to be supported. So that’s why I chose to use paper. だから私は紙を使うことを選びました。 Making a cancer sensor out of paper is about as simple as making chocolate chip cookies, which I love. 紙でがんセンサーを作るのは、大好きなチョコチップクッキーを作るのと同じぐらい簡単です。 You start with some water, pour in some nanotubes, add antibodies, mix it up, take some paper, dip it, dry it, and you can detect cancer. 水から始め、ナノチューブを注ぎ、抗体を加え、混ぜ合わせ、紙を取り、浸し、乾燥させると、がんを検出できます。

(Applause)

Then, suddenly, a thought occurred that kind of put a blemish on my amazing plan here. そして、突然、ここで私の素晴らしい計画にそのような傷をつけるような考えが起こりました。 I can’t really do cancer research on my kitchen countertop. My mom wouldn’t really like that. 私のお母さんはそんなこと好きではないでしょう。 So instead, I decided to go for a lab. So I typed up a budget, a materials list, a timeline, and a procedure, and I emailed it to 200 different professors at Johns Hopkins University and the National Institutes of Health, essentially anyone that had anything to do with pancreatic cancer. And I sat back waiting for these positive emails to be pouring in, saying, "You’re a genius! そして、「あなたは天才だ」というポジティブなメールが殺到するのをじっと待っていたのです! You’re going to save us all!" And — (Laughter)

Then reality took hold, and over the course of a month, I got 199 rejections out of those 200 emails. その後、現実が定着し、1か月の間に200通のメールから199件の拒否がありました。 One professor even went through my entire procedure, painstakingly -- I’m not really sure where he got all this time -- and he went through and said why each and every step was like the worst mistake I could ever make. 1人の教授が私の手順全体を苦労して実施しました-彼が今どこにいるのか本当にわかりません-そして彼は通り抜けて、すべてのステップがなぜ私がこれまでに犯した中で最悪の間違いのようだったのかを言いました。 Clearly, the professors did not have as high of an opinion of my work as I did. 明らかに、教授たちは私の研究ほど私に対する意見については高く評価していませんでした。

However, there was a silver lining. しかし、銀の裏地がありました。 One professor said, "Maybe I might be able to help you, kid." ある教授は「私はあなたを助けることができるかもしれません、子供」と言いました。 So I went in that direction. だから私はその方向に行きました。

(Laughter)

As you can never say no to a kid. あなたが子供にノーと言うことは決してできないので。

And so then, three months later, I finally nailed down a harsh deadline with this guy, and I get into his lab, I get all excited, and then I sit down, I start opening my mouth and talking, and five seconds later he calls in another Ph.D. それで、3か月後、ついにこの男と厳しい締め切りを迎え、彼の研究室に入り、すべてのことに興奮し、それから座って、口を開けて話し始め、5秒後に彼は話し始めました。別の博士号を呼び出す Ph.D. 博士 's just flock into this little room, and they’re just firing these questions at me, and by the end, I kind of felt like I was in a clown car. ちょうどこの小さな部屋に集まり、彼らは私にこれらの質問を投げかけているだけです。 There were 20 Ph.D. 20の博士号がありました 's plus me and the professor crammed into this tiny office space with them firing these rapid-fire questions at me, trying to sink my procedure. プラス、私と教授はこの小さなオフィススペースにぎゅうぎゅう詰めに詰め込み、急いで質問を投げかけ、私の手続きを沈めようとしました。 How unlikely is that? それはどれほどありそうもないことですか? I mean, pshhh. つまり、pshhh。

(Laughter) (笑い)

However, subjecting myself to that interrogation, I answered all of their questions, and I guessed on quite a few but I got them right, and I finally landed the lab space I needed. しかし、私はその尋問に身を委ねて、私は彼らの質問のすべてに答えました、そして私はかなりの数を推測しましたが、私はそれらを正しく理解し、そして私は最終的に必要な実験室スペースに着陸しました。

But it was shortly afterwards that I discovered my once brilliant procedure had something like a million holes in it, and over the course of seven months, I painstakingly filled each and every one of those holes. しかし、それから間もなく、私はかつてのすばらしい手順に100万個の穴のようなものがあることを発見し、7か月の間に、それらの穴のすべてを入念に埋めました。

The result? One small paper sensor that costs three cents and takes five minutes to run. 3セントで実行に5分かかる小さな紙センサー1つ。 This makes it 168 times faster, over 26,000 times less expensive, and over 400 times more sensitive than our current standard for pancreatic cancer detection. これにより、現在の膵癌検出基準よりも168倍速く、26,000倍以上安価で、400倍以上感度が高くなります。

(Applause)

One of the best parts of the sensor, though, is that it has close to 100 percent accuracy, and can detect the cancer in the earliest stages when someone has close to 100 percent chance of survival. しかし、センサーの優れた点の1つは、100%に近い精度を備えており、生存率が100%に近い人であれば、がんを最も早い段階で検出できることです。 And so in the next two to five years, this sensor could potentially lift for pancreatic cancer survival rates from a dismal 5.5 percent to close to 100 percent, and it would do similar for ovarian and lung cancer. したがって、今後2〜5年で、このセンサーは膵臓がんの生存率を悲惨な5.5%から100%近くに引き上げる可能性があり、卵巣がんと肺がんでも同様の効果が得られます。

But it wouldn’t stop there. By switching out that antibody, you can look at a different protein, thus, a different disease, potentially any disease in the entire world. その抗体を切り替えることで、別のタンパク質、つまり別の病気、潜在的には世界中のあらゆる病気を調べることができます。 So that ranges from heart disease to malaria, HIV, AIDS, as well as other forms of cancer -- anything.

And so hopefully one day we can all have that one extra uncle, that one mother, that one brother, sister, we can have that one more family member to love, and that our hearts will be rid of that one disease burden that comes from pancreatic, ovarian and lung cancer, and potentially any disease, that through the Internet anything is possible. そして、うまくいけば、いつか私たちはすべて、1人の余分な叔父、1人の母親、1人の兄弟、姉妹、愛する家族をもう1人持つことができ、心臓から来る1つの病気の重荷を取り除くことができます膵臓癌、卵巣癌、肺癌、そして潜在的にはあらゆる疾患であり、インターネットを通じて何でも可能です。 Theories can be shared, and you don’t have to be a professor with multiple degrees to have your ideas valued. 理論を共有することができ、あなたのアイデアを評価するために複数の学位を持つ教授である必要はありません。 It’s a neutral space, where what you look like, age or gender, it doesn’t matter. それはあなたがどのように見えるか、年齢や性別、それは重要ではない中立的な空間です。 It’s just your ideas that count. For me, it’s all about looking at the Internet in an entirely new way to realize that there’s so much more to it than just posting duck-face pictures of yourself online. You could be changing the world.

So if a 15-year-old who didn’t even know what a pancreas was could find a new way to detect pancreatic cancer, just imagine what you could do. したがって、膵臓が何であるかさえ知らなかった15歳の人が膵臓癌を検出するための新しい方法を見つけることができたとしたら、何ができるか想像してみてください。

Thank you.

(Applause) (拍手)