The beginning of 2023 is tremendous for HCS Pharma in terms of new oncology-related collaborative R&D projects, with three of them accepted and granted by ANR (Agence Nationale pour la Recherche) through the Plan France Relance, and by the Région Hauts-de-France through STIMuLE plan. It has been announced in a press release, relayed by the CNRS (Centre national de la recherche scientifique) here.

Focused on BIOMIMESYS technology, all 3 projects are organized with 3 different teams of ONCOLille institute, lead by Dr Isabelle Van Seuningen:

  • A project dealing with Mucins, cancer and drug resistance Team of OncoLille (CANTHER-MUCINE) in the frame of pancreatic cancer, which supervised by Dr. Vincent Senez (ONCOLille) and Dr. Méryl Roudaut (HCS Pharma). With the recruitment of Orégane Bajeux as an engineer for this project, the objective is to develop a preclinical model of pancreatic cancer, which will reproduce the mechanical stress found in the tumoral microenvironment thanks to a relevant microfluidic system.
  • A project dealing with lung cancer, in collaboration with Université de Lille, Inserm, CNRS, Lille Regional Hospital (CHU Lille) and Institut Pasteur. The project is lead by Dr Zoulika KHERROUCHE (OncoLille) and Dr Véronique De Conto (HCS Pharma), and Dr Marie Fernandes was hired as a post-doctoral researcher to work on the development of a human in vitro model for targeted therapy in lung cancers using BIOMIMESYS® technology. This models will allow to study the impact of oncogenic mutations on resistance to targeted therapies in lung cancer, and thus to assess anti-cancerous molecules, for personalized medicine or High Content Screening.
  • And, a project dealing with colon cancer, in collaboration with the team “Inflammasome et ion channels” of PHYCELL Lab (INSERM U1003), supervised by Dr. Mathias Chamaillard (ONCOLille) and Véronique De Conto (HCS Pharma). Sofian Allam has been hired as an engineer for this project. The objective is to develop a 3D complex model of dysbiosis-induced colon cancer, composed of cancerous cells, cancer-associated fibroblasts, macrophages, and bacteria in a complex in vitro model. This complex model will be used to screen molecules in order to develop innovative drugs against colon cancer, targeting not only the cancer cells but also the tumoral microenvironment.
Dr Marie Fernandes and Orégane Bajeux using ImageXpres confocal microscope on HCS Pharma’s platform for phenotypic screening, observing cancer cells in BIOMIMESYS.

We are looking forward to validating all of these models with the help of our great academic collaborators, with the aim to develop more effective therapies to cure patients. Thanks to our partners in these projects, to Plan France Relance and to Région Hauts-de-France.

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