The contraception pill has revolutionised women’s lives, but also influenced much more: it creates a different version of ourselves, has an impact on the metabolism, the shape of our microbiome, the work of our immune system, and what goes on in our heads. Certain combinations of synthetic hormones used in some pills can higher the risk of breast cancer and thrombosis.
For this project I visited Dr. Catherine Brisken’s lab at EPFL in Lausanne and accompanied the scientists during the studies on this correlation.
Human tissues from the mammary glands are implanted into laboratory mice, which are then treated with artificial hormones. This research has revealed that certain hormone combinations in pills increase the risk of breast cancer more than others. The main culprit are progestins, synthetic mimics of the pregnancy hormone progesterone that stimulate cell growth in the breast.
In my work I was using different techniques to reveal these research outcome and raise the awareness on how important it is to make a better decision on which contraception to use.

This project was a semester project of the Master Photography studies at ECAL in Lausanne.