Vivien Maltez, PhD

Cancer is not a single disease, but many. Of those, pancreatic cancer is one of the deadliest. Current treatments help only a small number of patients, and doctors still cannot predict who will respond well and who will not. New treatment strategies are urgently needed. Our research studies immune cells that live inside tumors. Some of these immune cells help hide and protect the tumor rather than attacking it. However, we recently made an unexpected discovery: some of these cells can change sides and begin attacking the tumor and helping us. We want to understand why this happens. Why do some cells switch sides while others do not? What signals tell them to change? Answering these questions could reveal new ways to improve cancer treatment. To do this, we will study immune cells in pancreatic tumors and compare what we learn with samples from patients. We will look for clues that show which tumors contain immune cells that can be changed into cancer-fighting cells. This work will improve our understanding of how the body’s defenses respond to cancer. It may also help doctors identify patients who are more likely to benefit from treatment and guide the development of new therapies for pancreatic cancer and other hard-to-treat cancers.