Activities

Our group aims at the identification of new biomarkers for an early diagnosis of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDA) and novel therapeutic targets.
The development of the immunotherapeutic strategy is based on the vaccination with DNA that codes for molecules selected for their ability to induce a strong antibody and cellular reaction in pancreatic cancer patients. For this we focus on the analysis of the immune response in PDA patients and pre-clinical models.
Main goals of lab research are:
• Discovery of serological tumor bio-markers to improve early diagnosis;
• Identification of molecular targets to promote an antitumor immune response;
• Development of DNA vaccines, to create and implement clinical protocols for PDA immunotherapy;
• Chemotherapy-based treatments to elicit novel tumor associated antigens;
• Study of tumor microenvironment’s impact in PDA
progression.

Group

• Prof. Francesco Novelli (PI)
• Prof.ssa Paola Cappello 
• Claudia Curcio (Research fellow)
• Sergio Occhipinti (Research fellow)
• Roberta Curto (Technician)
• Annamaria Cena (Technician)
• Eleonora Isoardi (Technician)
• Silvia Brugiapaglia (PhD Student)
• Sara Bulfamante (PhD Student)
• Gianluca Mucciolo (PhD Student)
• Cecilia Roux (PhD Student)
• Alessandro Scagliotti (PhD Student)
• Anurag Srivastava (PhD Student)
• Giorgia Guadagnin (Trainee)