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Protease‐guided tumor targeting tools to revolutionize cancer diagnosis and treatment.

Description du projet

Outils innovants de ciblage des tumeurs à des fins diagnostiques et thérapeutiques

Les protéases sont souvent fortement surexprimées dans le microenvironnement tumoral (MET), et leurs sites actifs permettent une liaison de haute affinité des vecteurs. Fort de ce constat, les protéases sont des candidats idéaux pour le ciblage des tumeurs, et des innovations récentes ont recours à des vecteurs de petites molécules pour cibler les protéases du MET. Financé par le programme Actions Marie Skłodowska-Curie, le projet OncoProTools vise à révolutionner le diagnostic et le traitement du cancer en développant des approches innovantes de ciblage des protéases dans la thérapie par lymphocytes T à récepteur antigénique chimérique, en découvrant de nouveaux vecteurs qui se lient à davantage de protéases du MET et en introduisant des diagnostics innovants, qui reposent sur une meilleure compréhension de la biologie du MET. Qui plus est, OncoProTools assurera la formation de 10 doctorants, qui leur permettra de devenir des chefs de file dans la recherche sur le cancer.

Objectif

Europe has a high cancer burden: in 2020, 2.7 million EU citizens were diagnosed with the disease and 1.3 million lost their lives to it. This toll is expected to increase further, mainly because Europe's population is ageing: by 2035, cancer will be the leading cause of death in the EU. In 2021, the EC published its ‘Europe's Beating Cancer Plan’ (EBCP), calling for a big push in cancer research. Cancer diagnostics and therapeutics should rapidly become more effective and selective, patient-friendly and personalized.

All these goals are directly addressed by developing better tumor targeting strategies. Typically, they consist of equipping diagnostics and therapeutics with a vector unit. The vector unit binds to a protein that is overexpressed on cancer cells or in the Tumor Micro-Environment (TME), causing the diagnostic or therapeutic payload to accumulate in the tumor. Over the last decades, huge effort has gone in approaches that use antibodies as vectors, but return-on-investment has overall been rather poor. Exciting, recent innovations rely on small molecule vectors that target TME proteases. Proteases are ideal candidates for tumor targeting: they are often strongly overexpressed in the TME and possess an active site that allows high-affinity anchoring of vectors. Members of this consortium have played a leading role in these developments.

OncoProTools wants to force breakthroughs in cancer diagnosis and therapy by:
1) Exploring innovative venues for protease targeting in CAR T cell therapy.
2) Discovering novel vectors that bind to other TME proteases: cathepsins S, B, L and granzyme B
3) Personalize applications of protease targeting: deliver innovative diagnostics through deeper understanding of TME biology.

At the same time, OncoProTools will deliver a training program that truly captures the MSCA values, to 10 Doctoral Candidates. They will be provided with all capabilities to become leaders of tomorrow's R&I in Europe.

Coordinateur

UNIVERSITEIT ANTWERPEN
Contribution nette de l'UE
€ 525 240,00
Adresse
PRINSSTRAAT 13
2000 Antwerpen
Belgique

Voir sur la carte

Région
Vlaams Gewest Prov. Antwerpen Arr. Antwerpen
Type d’activité
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
Liens
Coût total
Aucune donnée

Participants (7)

Partenaires (13)