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La Marató de TV3 provides funding for a project from the Combinatorial Chemistry Unit at PCB

By 13 de November de 2013November 18th, 2020No Comments
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Dr. Miriam Royo (third from left) during the grant award ceremony. Photo: TV3 Marathon Foundation.
 13.11.2013

La Marató de TV3 provides funding for a project from the Combinatorial Chemistry Unit at PCB

Yesterday, Tuesday November 12, the Biomedical Research Park of Barcelona hosted the grant award ceremony for the projects that have been awarded financial support from the funds raised by the La Marató de TV3 2012 call, which was dedicated to cancer research. The Combinatorial Chemistry Unit (UQC-PCB) at the Parc Científic de Barcelona has been one of the beneficiaries of the funds for a project on personalized nanomedicine for breast cancer. The project will be developed in collaboration with the Nanobiotechnology research group of the Institute of Biotechnology and Biomedicine of the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB) and the CIBBIM - Nanomedicine from the Vall d' Hebron Research Institute (VHIR). The new therapy can help overcome multidrug resistance characteristic of breast cancer stem cells.


The project titled “Personalized Nanomedicine for triple-negative breast cancer stem cells” was awarded with € 395,095. The objective of the project is the development and preclinical validation of different drug delivery systems targeted to CD44 and CXCR1 receptors to eradicate efficiently triple-negative cancer stem cells in breast tumors.

Triple-negative breast cancers are characterized by not having detectable levels of estrogen and progesterone receptors or HER2/neu amplification. This means that no targeted therapy currently exists to treat patients with these cancers, which makes sufferers have a very low survival prognosis for this disease. Thus, the generation of specific treatments for this type of cancer represents a social and medical need of the utmost relevance.

“Targeting antitumor therapy specifically to these types of cells is expected to significantly improve the survival and quality of life of women affected by this disease,” – says Dr. Miriam Royo, head of Combinatorial Chemistry Platform at PCB, who will be working in this research project along with researchers Ibane Abasolo at the Valle Hebron Research Institute ( VHIR ) and Esther Vazquez from the Institute of Biotechnology and Biomedicine from the UAB.

42 research projects on cancer

The success of the fundraising telethon of La Marató 2012 has financed 42 research projects on cancer, allocating more than 11 million Euros to this end. This is the largest number of projects funded within the same call from the Foundation and at the same time, the most important investment in research that has been done in the 21-year history of the program.

A total of 79 research groups will work over the next three years in creating new methods of prevention and diagnosis of cancer and in the design of more effective therapies based on personalized medicine. Of the 42 projects to be funded, 19 are unitary, carried out by one single center, and 23 are coordinated between two or three research institutions. The projects will be conducted in 54 centers: 41 in Catalonia, 10 in the rest of Spain, and 3 internationally.

318 projects were submitted to the call for cancer research announced by La Marató Foundation in February. These projects were evaluated by 257 cancer experts from 37 different countries. The evaluation process was coordinated by the Agency for Health Quality and Assessment of Catalonia (AQuAS) – attached to the Department of Health of the Generalitat of Catalonia- and was carried out using the ‘ peer review ‘ system or ‘review performed by one´s equals ‘ (peer review , in English ) – the method of quality control most widely used in scientific publishing – from which the methodological rigor and feasibility of projects is assessed.