Project description
Leveraging liver-derived information to tackle pancreatic cancer
Pancreatic cancer is an aggressive disease that progresses and metastasises quickly. Unfortunately, it is not usually diagnosed until its advanced stages. The ERC-funded SYST-E-MET project proposes that the liver contributes to the progression of pancreatic cancer. Therefore, liver-derived information can be used for predicting patient outcomes and influencing treatment strategies to boost survival rates and improve patients’ quality of life. To explore this, the project will conduct a translational study to assess treatment decisions based on liver diagnostics, allowing treatment to be administered locally or systemically according to the metastatic nature of the cancer. Ultimately, it seeks to confront pancreatic cancer through a more tailored approach to chemotherapy and immunotherapy.
Objective
What would you do if you were diagnosed with pancreatic cancer?
The chance that it would happen is not that high (life-time risk of 1/60), but neither is the chance to survive (10%). In addition, the quality of life as a patient is severely compromised by inadequate understanding of the metastatic process, and lack of targeted treatment options or biomarkers to individualize treatment, leading to severe side-effects despite lack of treatment response in most cases.
To make a difference and challenge this disease, by appreciating the systemic nature of cancer, I propose to focus on the role of the liver, the main organ of metastasis leading to subsequent death, in pancreatic cancer. I recently demonstrated the potential of using liver-derived information to predict outcomes in pancreatic cancer patients undergoing resection for localized disease (Bojmar et al., Nature Medicine, 2024). With this proposal, I suggest that the liver plays an active role in the progression of pancreatic cancer, and that this can be used to inform on treatment decisions, thereby improving the survival and quality of life in this patient group.
I will investigate this concept through a translational study led by my team to evaluate treatment decisions guided by liver-based diagnostics, aiming at directing treatment locally or systemically, based on the metastatic biology of the cancer. Improving our knowledge about this stage of the disease could provide a treatment-window and open the door for tailoring chemo- and immuno-therapy, based on the systemic nature of the disease. I am uniquely positioned to lead this study, with my previous experience from the U.S. leading the first study of the human “pre-metastatic liver” in pancreatic cancer patients. Now independently established with my translational team and liver-based trials in the Swedish population, I aim to understand and tackle pancreatic cancer’s metastatic potential, thereby improving the life of afflicted patients.
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 clinical medicine oncology
- medical and health sciences basic medicine immunology immunotherapy
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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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Topic(s)
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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.
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants
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Call for proposal
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Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2025-STG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
581 83 Linkoping
Sweden
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