The annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) is a feast for researchers in the field – you not only get to know the state-of-the-art techniques that are being used in your specific cancer type of interest but also where the research in other cancer entities is heading. Cancerous diseases in different organs of origin follow very distinct patterns due to the unique niches every organ provides. Unfortunately, this means that dramatic progress in the treatment of breast cancer does not necessarily benefit pancreatic cancer patients. However, the techniques used to investigate deregulated signaling pathways within one cancer entity can be used to study another. Thus, surrounding myself with cancer researchers from all over the worldat AACR 2024, studying the tumor microenvironment in breast, prostate, esophageal, and pancreatic cancer is an extremely enriching experience.
I will present my latest advances in understanding how myofibroblastic cancer-associated fibroblasts (myCAFs) and myeloid cells shape local immunosuppression in the poster session on the pancreatic cancer microenvironment on April 8th, 9:00 am to 12:30 pm. We observed that targeting myCAFs in a mouse model of pancreatic cancer led to an expansion of the myeloid cell population. What characterizes these newly emerging myeloid cells? Are the tumor-resident myeloid cells expanding or does a reduction in myCAF numbers lead to enforced invasion of peripheral myeloid cells? And, what happens if we target myCAFs and myeloid cells simultaneously? These questions and many more will be answered through diverse techniques on my poster: “Disrupting local immunosuppression by combined myCAF/myeloid targeting inpancreatic cancer”. Stop by and have a chat!
