Meet Two of the Bold Inventors Behind Hologic’s Groundbreaking Technologies
Ashwini Kshirsagar (top left) points out an AI-detected abnormality on a mammography image while Irina Panteleeva (right) stands next to a Bioruptor® sonication device, which is used by researchers to prepare samples, such as before DNA sequencing. Both women hold multiple patents.
Ashwini Kshirsagar was born in India and, after a grade school biology project piqued her interest in science, pursued a career in medical imaging. Irina Panteleeva grew up in Russia and later moved to Western Europe to study epigenetics, which focuses on how changes in a cell’s chemistry can affect gene activity, before becoming a scientist at a small startup company.
While these two women may appear to have little in common, they’re connected in one important way: Kshirsagar and Panteleeva are both patent holders of innovative technologies at Hologic and belong to a relatively small percentage of women patent holders globally. While it’s reported that only 18% of inventors holding international patents were women in 2023,1 this number continues to rise.
Leading the way in breast cancer detection
After earning her PhD from the University of Cambridge and moving to the U.S., Kshirsagar joined a startup in the early 2000s called R2 Technology, which later became part of Hologic. Her work as an algorithm development scientist focused on computer-aided detection, a software that helps identify areas suspicious of breast cancer on mammography images.
“These were the early stages of what we know today as AI, though that buzzword wasn’t around yet,” says Kshirsagar. “Technology wasn't as fast for processing the data, so everything was on a much smaller scale. Today, we see AI models that have millions of tuning parameters — but we started with just one or two layers of mathematical models.”
Other major advancements in mammography over the past few decades include the transition from film to digital and the arrival of the 3D mammogram — an imaging test that combines multiple x-ray “slices” to create a 3D picture of the breast — which ushered in a new era for cancer screening. But with this new technology, new scientific problems emerged for Kshirsagar and her team.
Because both the 2D and 3D images are needed, in combination, for a radiologist to make a clinical diagnosis, concerns were raised about the additional x-ray exposure for the patient with two sets of images being taken. The solution? A technology called C-ViewTM Software, which combines all the “slices” from the 3D mammogram into a computer-generated 2D image that can be compared against a woman’s prior 2D scans. Besides minimizing the patient’s radiation exposure, this technology can help improve workflow efficiency for the radiologist.
“Anything we can do to help the radiologist find smaller and smaller cancer is what we’re focused on,” says Kshirsagar, who is listed as a patent owner for the C-View Software, as well as multiple other innovations related to modern AI use in breast cancer detection.
One such technology is the groundbreaking Genius AI® Detection solution, which was shown to find approximately one additional cancer for every 10 identified by a radiologist in a study submitted to the FDA.2 The team continues to innovate Genius AI Detection, and the latest version of the technology demonstrated over a 70% reduction in false positive marks compared with 2D ImageChecker CAD, Hologic’s original cancer detection AI solution.3
Quote from Ashwini Kshirsagar
“With breast cancer we know that the earlier you find it, the better the chances of survival — and with AI algorithms advancing all the time, this technology’s going to continue to revolutionize healthcare in extraordinary ways.”
Inventing the future of epigenetics
Like Kshirsagar, Irina Panteleeva began her career working for a small startup. After moving from Russia to France to pursue her postdoc, Panteleeva accepted an R&D role at Diagenode, a Belgium-based company that was exploring the use of chromatin — a type of genetic material composed of DNA and proteins — for furthering advancements in diseases like cancer. Today, chromatin is increasingly being used to help scientists understand gene expression changes in various diseases, providing critical insights to aid in the development of targeted therapies.
Besides its leading role in epigenetics, Diagenode develops and manufactures real-time PCR assays for pathogen detection on the Panther Fusion® system, a fully automated molecular testing platform that allows labs to consolidate and run multiple assays for women's health, infectious disease and COVID-19 testing. Diagenode became part of Hologic in 2021.
Quote from Irina Panteleeva
“It’s so important for us to understand how chromatin is organized and how it is regulated in the body, because deregulation of chromatin can lead to diseases like cancer. Our goal is to provide the tools for our customers and research groups, but also biopharma companies, to study chromatin in different contexts to support the development of more targeted, more personalized treatments for patients.”
Panteleeva currently holds two patents and is expecting a third soon. She was the primary inventor of a device called the Bioruptor sonicator, which is used by researchers to prepare samples, such as before DNA sequencing. The Bioruptor sonicator uses ultrasonic waves to shear DNA, RNA or chromatin into smaller fragments. This process is essential for various molecular biology techniques, including next-generation sequencing, as it breaks down the DNA and biological complexes into manageable pieces for detailed analysis. Such investigations are crucial for medical research and can aid in drug discovery for multiple diseases.
“More and more drugs are coming onto the market, including those to treat cancer, based on what we learn from chromatin,” says Panteleeva. “It’s amazing how we can use something as complex as chromatin to fuel scientific discovery and improve patients' lives. My son is in the process of deciding what he wants to do in life, and I always tell him to make sure you like what you do. We’re making a real difference at Hologic, and I’m proud to be a part of that.”