Funding for Cellular Immunology

The Cellular Immunology lab at ICGEB Trieste, Italy has recently received research grants from the Italian Foundation for Cancer Research (AIRC) and Worldwide Cancer Research (WWCR)

Federica Benvenuti, Group Leader, Cellular Immunology at ICGEB Trieste, provides a brief description of funding recently awarded for research into lung cancer.

AIRC 5-year funding has been received to support the project:

"Harnessing the power of type 1 dendritic cells to improve anti-tumoral response in lung cancer (DCgun)"

This project intends to address key knowledge gaps in understanding the orchestration of antitumoral immunity to lung tumors and to identify novel therapeutic axes. Specifically, the project will explore the composition of tissue determinants of antitumoral immunity, the impact of systemic factors on the skewing of hematopoiesis in the bone marrow and the potential of a therapy that boost development of type 1 dendritic cells to restore effective anticancer T cells.

Worldwide Cancer Research (WWCR) 3-years project:

"Dissecting early stages of alveolar macrophage-cancer cell interactions in 3D lung organoids"

This project aims to recapitulate the early stages of carcinogenesis in 3D organoids and to reconstitute the system with lung macrophages to precisely define their impact on tumour evolution. Using a unique approach to control the activation of oncogenes in a controlled fashion and the group's long-standing expertise in isolation of diverse myeloid cell subsets from the tumour microenvironment, the project will identify strategies to interrupt detrimental macrophage-cancer cell cross-talk, potentially transforming lung cancer therapy.

Exciting times ahead!