Pediatric sarcomas are understudied and deadly cancers, with no new therapies and very little improvement of patient outcomes. In her project, Tomazou will create in vitro and in vivo models that reflect the developmental origins of these cancers in order to accelerate drug discovery and precision medicine. Her group will take an engineering-inspired “build it to understand it” approach, based on breakthroughs in stem cell biology, CRISPR technology and single-cell sequencing, and on the epigenetic programs that reflect the developmental origin of these tumors. “We clearly have to rethink the science and find new ways to tackle these devastating tumors. The creation of faithful in vitro and in vivo models of pediatric sarcomas could be an impactful scientific advance in the field,” says Tomazou.
Credit: Harald Eisenberger
Pediatric sarcomas are understudied and deadly cancers, with no new therapies and very little improvement of patient outcomes. In her project, Tomazou will create in vitro and in vivo models that reflect the developmental origins of these cancers in order to accelerate drug discovery and precision medicine. Her group will take an engineering-inspired “build it to understand it” approach, based on breakthroughs in stem cell biology, CRISPR technology and single-cell sequencing, and on the epigenetic programs that reflect the developmental origin of these tumors. “We clearly have to rethink the science and find new ways to tackle these devastating tumors. The creation of faithful in vitro and in vivo models of pediatric sarcomas could be an impactful scientific advance in the field,” says Tomazou.
“We are thrilled that Eleni Tomazou’s research has been recognized by the European Research Council, and we are confident that her work will have a significant impact on the treatment of pediatric sarcomas,” Prof. Kaan Boztug, MD, Scientific Director of St. Anna CCRI and two-time ERC Grantee himself.
Learn more here >> https://bit.ly/40iAg5a
About Eleni Tomazou, PhD
Eleni Tomazou has been a Principal Investigator at St. Anna Children’s Cancer Research Institute (CCRI) since 2018. The goal of her research group is to uncover the roles of epigenetic deregulation as an oncogenic mechanism, with a focus on fusion-driven pediatric sarcomas. The group studies how fusion oncogenic proteins rewire healthy cells for malignancy, with the perspective of exploiting this knowledge for improving pediatric sarcoma therapy. They apply state-of-the-art technologies that combine wet-lab and computational methods.
Prior to joining the CCRI, she did her PhD at the Wellcome Sanger Institute (Cambridge, UK) and postdoctoral training at the Broad Institute and the Harvard Department for Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology (Cambridge, USA). She is a recipient of a prestigious Elise Richter Fellowship by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF).
Learn more about the research of Eleni Tomazou here: https://ccri.at/research-group/eleni-tomazou-group/
About St. Anna Children’s Cancer Research Institute, St. Anna CCRI
St. Anna CCRI is an internationally renowned multidisciplinary research institution with the aim to develop and optimize diagnostic, prognostic, and therapeutic strategies for the treatment of children and adolescents with cancer. To achieve this goal, it combines basic research with translational and clinical research and focus on the specific characteristics of childhood tumor diseases in order to provide young patients with the best possible and most innovative therapies. Dedicated research groups in the fields of tumor genomics and epigenomics, immunology, molecular biology, cell biology, bioinformatics and clinical research are working together to harmonize scientific findings with the clinical needs of physicians to ultimately improve the wellbeing of our patients.
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Mag. Anna Egger
Science Communication Manager
St. Anna Kinderkrebsforschung /
St. Anna Children’s Cancer Research Institute – CCRI
1090 Wien, Zimmermannplatz 10
P: +43 1 40470 – 4067