A new blood test may detect leukemia risk and replace bone marrow sampling: Study

In the new study, a research team led by Dr. Nili Furer, Nimrod Rappoport and Oren Milman, in collaboration with physicians and researchers in Israel and the United States, showed that rare blood stem cells – which occasionally exit the bone marrow and enter the bloodstream – carry diagnostic information about MDS. The researchers demonstrated that with a simple blood test and advanced single-cell genetic sequencing, it is possible to identify early signs of the syndrome and even assess a person’s risk of developing blood cancer.

The researchers also discovered that the migrating stem cells can serve as a clock for our chronological age, and that in males, their population changes earlier than in women in a way that increases the risk of cancer. This finding may explain the higher prevalence of blood cancers among men. The scientists believe that using the test to diagnose MDS and leukemia is only the beginning, and that in the future it could be applied to a range of other blood-related disorders. The current findings are already being tested in a large-scale clinical trial at several medical centers around the world.

In addition to his laboratory research, Shlush is also a senior physician at Assuta Medical Center in Ashdod and at Maccabi Healthcare Services, and he heads the newly established Miriam and Aaron Gutwirth Medical School at the Weizmann Institute. The school was founded to address the emerging needs and challenges of the worlds of medicine and research and to bridge, as much as possible, the gap between today’s science and tomorrow’s medicine. Unlike existing programs around the world that combine medicine with research, the new program is expected to unify and intertwine the clinical and research components. The school is scheduled to open its doors for the first time this coming October and aims to train the next generation of physician-scientists.

Reference:

Furer, N., Rappoport, N., Milman, O. et al. A reference model of circulating hematopoietic stem cells across the lifespan with applications to diagnostics. Nat Med (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-025-03716-5.