The SSO Young Investigator Award has provided $125,000 to 5 researchers since its inception in 2016. SSO’s Research Grant Program is supported by the SSO Research and Education Fund, a restricted fund of the former SSO Foundation. The objective of the award is to promote and recognize translational or clinical research that advances innovative ideas and concepts designed to improve health outcomes through advances in the delivery of cancer-related care. The 2020 recipient is Sepideh Gholami, MD from the University of California Davis. Her research is titled, “An Ex-vivo 3D Chip to Investigate Response to Therapy and Immune Cell Trafficking in Colorectal Liver Metastases.”
Dr. Gholami explains, “The overall objective of the research is to create an autologous ex-vivo model using a 3D microfluidic device to study the immune and tumor microenvironment of colorectal liver metastases. Specifically, we are interested in examining the immune tumor microenvironments RAS mutant tumors, which are less immune-rich compared to ones without the mutation. Microfluidic systems have existed to study various questions pertaining to cancer biology. The innovation in our proposal is to refine an invented model by Dr. Steven George (my mentor and Chair of Biomedical Engineering at UC Davis), to include the immune component so we can study the immune response of patients’ tumors and develop more efficacious immunotherapeutic strategies. The prime goal is to enhance and validate this 3D model to serve as a tool for the investigation of new therapeutics and to predict patient outcomes in prospective clinical trials.”
Dr. Gholami’s interest in this topic stems from her clinical focus in treating colorectal liver metastases and her goal of finding better ways to treat patients with high recurrence rates despite liver resection. Immunotherapy in this group of patients is less efficacious, with the exception of patients with microsatellite instability. Therefore, this treatment gap led to her interest in finding neoadjuvant immune-augmenting therapies that could enhance patient outcomes and finding a research platform that could study these types of patient samples.
“I was working on a neoadjuvant platform clinical trial with an in-depth tissue analysis to identify immune-augmenting combination therapies and biomarkers for colorectal liver metastases. Given my interest in translational science, I was introduced to Dr. Steven George via an old fellowship colleague Dr. Ryan Fields (Chief of Surgery at Washington University) for a potential collaboration using the 3D Chip technology. I’m very excited about this project and tremendously grateful of my mentors, who have expertise in bioengineering, immunology, molecular biology and surgical oncology. One of the most unique aspects about this new research experience is that we truly work as a team, learn from each other’s experience and perspective. I find that by using this multidisciplinary approach our research is more comprehensive and focused on advancing technology in the sciences that can improve patient outcomes,” said Dr. Gholami.
SSO’s Research Grant Program is supported by the SSO Research and Education Fund, a restricted fund of the former SSO Foundation. The availability of research grant funding is dependent on the financial support of SSO members and donors. Please donate generously to ensure that SSO members have an ongoing source of funds for research projects and 100% of your donation supports this program.