Grant: Doctoral Award - Frederick Banting and Charles Best Canada Graduate Scholarships

There are many barriers to successful cancer treatment, including the ability of cancer cells to resist immune destruction and chemotherapy. Normally, immune cells can recognize cancer cells and destroy them. However, tumour cells can evade immune-mediated death by displaying molecules on their surface that inactivate these immune cells. While much is known about how these molecules affect the immune cells, little is known about what happens to the cancer cell. Our research indicates that the interaction of these molecules with immune cells can increase chemoresistance in cancer cells. This interaction also makes cancer cells grow more quickly and activates signals that are important for tumour cell invasiveness and metastatic ability. Based on this, we hypothesize that the interaction between these tumour cell molecules and the immune cells provides tumour cells with a survival mechanism that leads to increased metastasis and drug resistance. We have three main objectives in this research project. We want to test if the interaction of these molecules increases the invasiveness and metastatic ability of cancer cells. We also want to elucidate how this molecular interaction leads to the drug resistance we see. Finally, we want to identify what other molecules are involved in the signalling pathways leading to these phenotypes, in the hopes of discovering druggable targets. To reach our goals, we will use cell culture and animal models, as well as pharmacological, biochemical, immunological, and molecular methods. The proposed studies are important because they will shed light on a relatively unstudied aspect of cancer development. In addition, the results of these studies may identify novel targets to halt cancer progression, as well as provide a stronger basis to combine immunotherapy and chemotherapy.