Understanding the role of chronic chlamydial infection in ovarian cancer

High-grade serous carcinoma (HGSC) is an aggressive subtype of ovarian cancer that accounts for 70-80% of deaths from all forms of ovarian cancer. HGSC is a silent killer with the worst prognosis and highest mortality of all gynecologic cancers. Despite some advances in clinical care, overall survival from HGSC has not improved substantially over the past 50 years. While BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutations are well characterized genetic risk factors, they are only present in 5-15% of all ovarian cases and most HGSC patients do not carry these mutations. Unfortunately, very little knowledge is available about non-genetic risk factors for HGSC. Chlamydia is a sexually transmitted infection that affects more than 150 million people worldwide caused by the bacterium Chlamydia trachomatis. Chlamydia can manifest as a "silent" infection in as many as 70% of women and 50% of men who contract the disease. Because these infections are asymptomatic, they often go undiagnosed and untreated which can lead to the development of pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) and serious reproductive complications. Human population studies have indicated a potential interrelationship between chlamydia, PID, and ovarian cancer. However, we still don't fully understand the exact role that chlamydia can play in ovarian cancer. We will tackle this question by combining two well-established animal disease models: one of HGSC and the other a repeated chronic chlamydia infection model. These experiments will allow us to understand if Chlamydia infection accelerates the development of HGSC and to dissect how infection contributes to critical steps of HGSC. We believe our study may bring new hopes for HGSC prevention. As chlamydia rates continue to rise globally, prevention and screening for chlamydia infections may dramatically help reduce the burden and devastation of ovarian cancer.