WFORCE Publishes New Study on Organoids & Immunotherapy

The WFORCE team has released a new article in the journal Clinical Cancer Research titled “Organoid Platform in Preclinical Investigation of Personalized Immunotherapy Efficacy in Appendiceal Cancer: Feasibility Study.” The goal of this study was to “preclinically explore the application of immunotherapy in treating appendix cancer in a personalized organoid model.” The study showed that “[i]nformation derived from immunocompetent organoids may be applied in selecting patients for clinical trial enrollment in rare diseases where preclinical models of disease are lacking.”  The goal of this research is to determine whether organoid data can be used to to guide clinical trial enrollment for appendix cancer patients.

This latest study follows the announcement in March that the WFORCE program will receive a $2.5 million grant from the National Cancer Institute.  Dr. Konstantinos I. Votanopoulos, director of WFORCE, received an ACPMP research grant for this work in 2018. ACPMP research grants are designed to serve as “seed funding” to initiate small scientific studies and/or clinical research studies, the results of which could be used to obtain funding from NIH, FDA or other funding agencies. In this case, the 2018 grant functioned exactly as designed, and we are thrilled to continue to support this exceptional program as a funding research partner of WFORCE.

The Wake Forest Organoid Research Center (WFORCE), is a joint effort between the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine and the Wake Forest Comprehensive Cancer Center. ACPMP is proud to be a part of this important initiative that will improve care for our patients.