June 2025: Rappoport and Shamir: A blood test may detect Leukemia risk

A study published in Nature Medicine reveals how blood stem cells change over the lifespan. As people age, changes in blood cell counts often signal a shift from health to disease. Blood stem cells produce all blood cell types throughout life, but how they vary in healthy individuals with age, and how this information can help diagnose disease, has not been well understood.

The study, led by the groups of Prof. Liran Shlush and Prof. Amos Tanay (Weismann Institute of Science) with Edmond J. Safra PhD student fellow Nimrod Rappoport (Shamir lab, Computer Science & AI) as one of the principal contributors, created a reference map of blood stem cells by analyzing single-cell RNA profiles from 148 healthy people of different ages and sexes. It found that older men show a stronger shift toward myeloid cells, identified age-related gene activity changes in lymphoid cells, and demonstrated that these patterns can help diagnose blood disorders like myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) from a simple blood draw. These findings may lead to a blood test to detect leukemia risk, replacing the invasive bone marrow tests. The research was performed in collaboration with Maccabi Healthcare Services, and Rambam Healthcare Campus.

The study was published just at the time when the Tanay and Shlush labs were destroyed by an Iranian missile.

Read more here.