Three research teams co-led by Carle Illinois College of Medicine faculty members are advancing transdisciplinary cancer research with the help of grant funding from the Cancer Center at Illinois. The projects tackle research questions ranging from immunotherapy responses to more effective head and neck cancer diagnostics. The research has the potential to improve the lives of individuals with cancer as well as the quality and accessibility of care.
CCIL grant funding fosters new collaborations, spanning the engineering and basic sciences continuum. The grants enable CCIL researchers to develop pilot projects that will mature and garner external funding. Each grant application is reviewed by a panel, following a process like the one used by the National Institutes of Health.
The research projects involving CI MED faculty members are listed below.
Planning Grant
- Project: Leverage of Biomaterial-Based Platforms in Cancer Neuroscience: Models for Multimodal Study of Radiotherapeutic Response in Brain Tumors
- Principal Investigator: Sara Pedron Haba
- Project Collaborators: Kim Selting and Catherine Best-Popescu
The CCIL awarded CI MED Research Assistant Professor Sara Pedron Haba a $25,000 Planning Grant, supporting her research proposal “Leverage of Biomaterial-Based Platforms in Cancer Neuroscience: Models for Multimodal Study of Radiotherapeutic Response in Brain Tumors.”
“This planning grant will advance our understanding of the influence of the tumor microenvironment in glioblastoma progression and will help consolidate multidisciplinary collaborations across medicine, engineering, and neuroscience to enable further funding opportunities,” said Pedron Haba.
Pedron Haba is a faculty member in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, as well as CI MED. Catherine Best-Popescu and CCIL member Kim Selting will join Pedron Haba as co-investigators on the project.
Seed Grants
- Project: Identification of Potential Diagnostic and Therapeutic Targets of Iron Metabolism in Head and Neck Cancer
- Principal Investigator: Chitra Subramanian
- Project Collaborators: Mark Cohen and Zeynep Madak Erdogan
CI MED Research Associate Professor Chitra Subramanian received $200,000 to support “Identification of Potential Diagnostic and Therapeutic Targets of Iron Metabolism in Head and Neck Cancer.” CI MED researcher and CCIL program leader Zeynep Madak Erdogan will be a Co-PI, and CI MED Dean Dr. Mark Cohen will be a co-investigator.
“Iron metabolism plays an essential role in cancer, including HNSCC. Iron can promote tumor growth or cell death. Due to dual properties of iron in cancer cells, understanding how altered iron metabolism would affect HNSCC and its tumor microenvironment will shed light on iron metabolism in cancer. Additionally, identifying the exosome biomarkers of iron metabolism will enable a noninvasive method of knowing the effect of targeting iron metabolism in HNSCC. The seed grant will provide funding for our research in understanding the essential role of iron metabolism. This research can enable translational identification of novel targets and biomarkers that alter the iron metabolism. We plan to submit a grant proposal to explore this in HNSCC patient tumors and publish our research findings,” she said.
“I would like to thank the CCIL for providing our group the seed grant funding to explore the role of Iron metabolism in head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) at the single cell level using spatial transcriptomics and single cell analysis,” Subramanian said.
- Project: Imaging-Based Biomarkers to Predict Glioma Immunotherapy Response
Left to right: Andrew Smith, Warren Dobrucki, and Fan Lam - Principal Investigator: Edward Roy
- Project Collaborators: David Kranz, Andrew Smith, Wawrzyniec Dobrucki, and Fan Lam
Edward Roy received $197,704 to support “Imaging-Based Biomarkers to Predict Glioma Immunotherapy Response.” Roy is a professor emeritus in the Department of Molecular and Integrative Physiology. His co-principal investigators include three CI MED faculty members who are also CCIL members: Andrew Smith, Health Innovation Professor Wawrzyniec Dobrucki, and Fan Lam. David Kranz is also a co-principal investigator.
The Cancer Center at Illinois (CCIL) grants support the most innovative ideas from Illinois faculty through grant programs that catalyze transdisciplinary cancer research. The selected projects reflect the university’s world-class engineering, technology, and basic sciences expertise. The multidisciplinary research teams are leading the discovery of cancer diagnostic and treatment methods that have the potential to improve the quality and accessibility of care and improve the lives of individuals with cancer.
Click here to learn more about the CCIL’s grant and funding programs.
The original version of this article by the Cancer Center at Illinois can be found here.