Project description
Understanding drug resistance in tumours
Tumours evolve from early-stage, curable diseases into treatment-resistant cancers, with therapy resistance posing a major challenge in oncology. Much of this resistance is believed to arise from heritable epigenetic changes in cancer cells, often referred to as the ‘dark matter’ of cancer evolution. These genetic and epigenetic adaptations can occur simultaneously within the same tumour. However, the limited understanding of these mechanisms hinders the development of new treatments. The ERC-funded DARC MATTER project aims to explore drug resistance in colorectal cancer. Using patient-derived organoid models, the project will investigate how these organoids evolve under cancer treatment. Advanced techniques will be employed to identify new resistance mechanisms and develop predictive models, ultimately improving drug combination strategies and patient outcomes.
Objective
Tumours evolve, transforming from early-stage curable disease into treatment-refractory, deadly cancer. Therapy resistance is arguably the biggest problem in oncology today, and much of it remains unexplained.
The central hypothesis of this proposal is that a large proportion of unexplained drug resistance is due to heritable epigenetic alterations, and non-heritable transcriptional plasticity in cancer cells. I refer to these mechanisms as the dark matter of cancer evolution. Genetic, epigenetic and transcriptional adaptation, together with changes in the tumour microenvironment, may happen at the same time in the same tumour. Lack of knowledge of these mechanisms hinders the development of new treatments strategies. Tackling drug resistance requires a unique combination of clinical cohorts, experimental models, evolutionary biology and computational methods.
I will map and quantify the mechanisms and evolutionary dynamics of genetic and non-genetic drug resistance at unprecedented scale. I will focus on colorectal cancer, the third most common cancer and second leading cause of cancer-related death worldwide. I will use patient-derived organoid models, matched to clinical cohorts followed longitudinally. I will measure organoid evolution under the pressure of cancer drugs, with and without the tumour microenvironment. I will track cell lineages with lentiviral barcoding and perform longitudinal single cell multi-omics, measuring genomes, epigenomes and transcriptomes of the same cell. I will interpret the results within a unique computational framework that brings together evolutionary theory with machine learning to measure, predict and control resistance.
This project will identify new mechanisms and dynamics of cancer drug resistance, deliver new predictive models, and find novel collateral drug sensitivities. This will allow designing rational drug combinations and schedules that will prevent or delay resistance, drastically improving patient outcome.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- medical and health sciences basic medicine pharmacology and pharmacy drug resistance
- natural sciences biological sciences genetics RNA transcriptomes
- medical and health sciences clinical medicine oncology
- natural sciences biological sciences genetics epigenetics epigenomes
- natural sciences biological sciences genetics genomes
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
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Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
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Call for proposal
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(opens in new window) ERC-2023-COG
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20157 Milano
Italy
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