Oncode Investigator Miao-Ping Chien (Erasmus MC) in collaboration with SkylineDx received a TKI-LSH PPP Allowance to kickstart a project aimed at investigating the underlying mechanisms that drive metastasis in head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC). Their approach is to leverage FUNseq, a cutting-edge technology developed and validated in Chien’s lab, to functionally profile the aggressive subpopulations of cancer cells and characterize them by single-cell sequencing. For this, they will collaborate with head and neck surgeons from Erasmus MC. The discovered mechanisms can yield new knowledge and insight into the process of metastasis in HNSCC and inform the design of new diagnostic and treatment strategies.
HNSCC remains one of the most common cancers worldwide. Despite the development of innovative therapies over the last years, the mortality rate is still 50%. Such low survival rates are attributed to tumor recurrence and (distant) metastasis and are partly also caused by a lack of robust biomarkers to predict treatment response.
Currently, the prognosis and the risk stratification of HNSCC patients are based exclusively on clinico-pathological features including age, tumor size, morphology, and tumor grade. However, these conventional characteristics have proven to be insufficient to accurately predict treatment outcomes and survival. The lack of efficient (predictive) biomarkers contributes to the dismally low median overall survival of only 6-15 months for patients with inoperable recurrent or distant metastatic HNSCC. There is, therefore, a high unmet need for improved biomarkers that can help predict metastasis, and risk-stratify the patients, thus enabling more risk-based design of intervention strategies (e.g., surveillance intensity and immunotherapy eligibility), and improving survival for patients with HNSCC.
This newly funded collaboration between Oncode Investigator Miao-Ping Chien, molecular diagnostics company SkylineDx, and surgeons at Erasmus MC - aims to tackle this unmet need and bring significant changes for HNSCC patients. “Together with SkylineDx, and in collaboration with Jose Hardillo, a head and neck surgeon at Erasmus MC, we aim to identify predictive signatures of tumor metastasis and therapeutic targets for HNSCC, and to tackle the poor prognosis of the disease, caused by metastases” says Chien. “The funding allows all involved parties to kickstart the collaboration. We can now collect single-cell profile HNSCC tumor samples and identify and validate target genes. And with the help of SkylineDx and Oncode Institute we hope to bring this knowledge to the clinic" she adds.
“We are honored to be at the forefront of discovery in HNSCC in collaboration with some of the smartest minds in this field,” says Jvalini Dwarkasing, Chief Scientific Officer of SkylineDx. “We look forward to applying our prognostic risk stratification tools with the technology developed by Miao-Ping Chien team to discover new biomarkers for clinical use with the aim of improving the treatment and outcomes for these patients.”