XXXI FERO Grant – Dr. Miguel F. de Sanmamed

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death worldwide. Treatment with immunotherapy in combination with chemotherapy prior to surgery has increased the survival of these patients. However, this therapeutic strategy is not effective in all cases and can even produce toxicities that delay or prevent surgery.

The NEO-nano IMPACT project, winner of the FERO Grant for young researchers sponsored by the ACS Foundation, proposes a highly innovative strategy based on injecting nanoparticles loaded with immunostimulatory mRNA into the tumor. These nanoparticles are designed to modify the tumor environment and enhance the immune response against cancer not only within the tumor, but also in the lymph nodes.

The ultimate goal of this project is to transform the efficacy of existing immunotherapies and reduce their toxicity to increase the chances of curing lung cancer.