Summer Research Series: Correlating Alcohol Consumption and Cancer

As pre-med students aspiring to focus on oncology, biology majors Amanda Stone ’27 and Caroline Abbott ’28 have found an ideal research topic – and a head start in their career pursuit through their summer research at Emmanuel.

Even more fitting for students pursuing minors in global & public health, the duo has been hard at work researching a surprisingly lesser-known global health concern: the connection between alcohol consumption and cancer.

This June marked Stone and Abbott’s second consecutive summer alongside Associate Professor of Biology Dr. Vincent Cannataro exploring how alcohol consumption manifests in certain cancer genomes.

This new lens on Cannataro’s body of research was inspired by a recent report from the Office of the United States Surgeon General, which compiles multiple studies emphasizing how alcohol consumption has proven to increase the risk of as many as seven different types of cancers (2025).

“Most American adults are aware that tobacco smoking can lead to cancer, or ultraviolet radiation can lead to cancer, but less than half of U.S. adults are aware of the association between alcohol consumption and cancer…it’s actually a major contributor to cancer in the United States. [Contributing to] about 100,000 cases a year and 20,000 deaths per year – and that’s why we’re turning our research lens this summer onto this question of how alcohol can drive cancer,” Dr. Cannataro said.

Using bioinformatics – which includes visual and data-based representations of genetic or molecular structures – Stone and Abbott are analyzing tumor genomes and looking for signatures that are associated with alcohol consumption within the genomes.

“We know what these signatures look like – smoking looks like something, aging looks like something…so when we see these things we can identify them,” Dr. Cannataro added.

Last year came with a learning curve for the student researchers. While it was intimidating to be getting involved in research for the first time, and specifically learning how to code as scientists, the progress that they’ve made going into year two has been incredibly rewarding.

From the research, they’re getting a feel for what it means to research a broad, real-world topic that doesn’t have a straight answer, building insights that carry with them outside of their work and developing habits for problem-solving and troubleshooting.

“Seeing how far we’ve come now, I couldn’t even imagine I’d be at this point last summer! It’s been about trying and trying again – one wrong outcome isn’t the be-all and end-all,” Stone said.

Rather than wet lab experience, coding is at the core of this work, meaning Abbott and Stone have extensive practice in a skill set they never thought they’d be developing on the pre-med track – making them increasingly versatile scientists – and eventually, more well-rounded physicians.

“What we’re doing now is so directly tied to what we want to pursue in our careers. Even when we come across some headaches, the gradual progress helps keep us going!” Abbott said.