There is an urgent need to develop more effective treatments for lung cancer. This project proposal is intended to examine the role of Toll Like Receptor agonists in combination with electrochemotherapy (ECT) as a treatment for lung cancer. This study will use an orthotopic murine model of primary lung cancer that progresses to stage IV metastatic disease.
The technology of electroporation facilitates targeted chemotherapy absorption and has been employed at the Cork Cancer Research Centre (CCRC) for both preclinical and clinical work over the last 10 years. Positive outcomes have been published from the clinical experience, in terms of tumour reduction and quality of life improvement. While electroporation facilitates local drug delivery and is effective at local tumour resolution with reduced side effects, it does not resolve systemic disease.
We intend to combine electrochemotherapy with a Toll Like Receptor agonist to stimulate the immune response further and target both the local and systemic disease.
The project primary endpoints will include analysis of gross tumour burden, survival, and tumour immune infiltrate following treatment with a small molecule inhibitor of the Toll Like Receptor agonist in combination with ECT.
Our aim within this proposal is to develop a treatment regime to treat both local and systemic lung cancer disease. We will work to validate the use of the combination treatment using preclinical models and identify optimal procedure for clinical application.
