Simon Haas awarded ERC Proof of Concept Grant

Immunotherapies that employ the body’s own immune system to fight cancer are already being used successfully to treat leukemia. Ideally, this involves influencing a person’s own immune cells in such a way that they can seek out and destroy cancer cells more effectively. Yet this therapeutic approach, which is expensive compared with other treatments, only works in a fraction of patients. What’s more, cancer cells may develop resistance to the modified immune cells. Until now, scientists were unable to predict which patients will benefit from immunotherapy.

Researchers led by Professor Simon Haas, head of the Systems Hematology, Stem Cells and Precision Medicine Group within the joint research focus “Single-Cell Approaches for Personalized Medicine” of the Berlin Institute of Health at Charité (BIH), the Max Delbrück Center, and Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, have developed novel methods based on single-cell analysis that can specifically analyze the interactions between immune cells and cancer cells. Their research has shown that these methods also shed light on how effective immunotherapy will be in patients. Now the researchers want to further develop their technological approach into a precision tool that can accurately predict which patients will benefit from immunotherapy and which will not. In addition, a better understanding of what causes resistance to immunotherapy will help doctors select targeted combination therapies for patients who may have resistance. “Such a clinical test would make it possible to treat patients with the most effective drugs in a more personalized way, while also sparing them from potential toxicity and reducing costs for the healthcare system,” explains Dr. Cornelia Eckert, head of the Molecular-Genetic and Immunological Reference Laboratory at Charité’s Department of Pediatric Oncology and Hematology.

First steps toward commercialization

The researchers have now been awarded an ERC Proof of Concept Grant, worth €150,000, to advance their project. The funding will specifically help the team translate their research findings into clinical practice. “We are delighted that the ERC, one of Europe’s most prestigious institutions for innovation and scientific excellence, shares our enthusiasm for turning our research into medical applications,” says Haas. Project implementation will be coordinated by Schayan Yousefian, a PhD student in Haas’s research group, who co-developed the methods and collected the first data for predicting treatment efficacy in a personalized manner. “This support will enable us to validate our approach in larger numbers of patients and take the first steps toward commercialization,” says Yousefian, adding that the team plans to collaborate closely with pharmaceutical companies.

The ERC Proof of Concept Grant scheme is highly competitive and is open only to researchers who currently hold, or have previously been awarded, ERC frontier research grants. In November 2022, Haas and his team received an ERC Starting Grant for their research into immunotherapies.