Research beyond COVID: how Barcelona seeks new solutions for cancer and malaria

Despite the fact that the pandemic has been taking the media spotlight for many months, other pathologies that previously received more attention continue to kill. Cancer and cardiovascular diseases continue to be one of the main causes of death in rich countries. That is why the CaixaResearch Health Research 2021 call has maintained its usual focus: infectious diseases ---there are many more than just coronavirus--- and neurodegenerative diseases, in addition to oncological and cardiovascular ones.

"It was a strategic and conscious decision not to modify the call and to maintain the level of funding allocated to these pathologies, which continue to be as important as or more important than covid," explains the director of the Research and Innovation department of the La Caixa Foundation, Ignasi López. In fact, of all the projects selected this year, none focus on SARS-COV-2, for which the entity already dedicated an exclusive call endowed with 1.8 million euros in May 2020.

In this edition, CaixaResearch Health Research has selected 30 projects from Spain and Portugal, with a total budget of 22.1 million euros. Of these, nine are led by Catalan research centers. For López, this figure confirms the leadership of Catalonia, and especially Barcelona, in biomedical research, and he adds that of the total of 105 projects selected since this line of aid was launched in 2018, 40 came from Catalan research centers.

For López, this figure confirms the leadership of Catalonia, and especially Barcelona, in biomedical research, and he adds that of the total of 105 projects selected since this line of aid was launched in 2018, 40 came from Catalan research centers

This call is one of the best endowed for research in the field of health, both in Spain and Portugal, above the aid provided by the Government and only below those promoted by Europe. Specifically, it finances projects with amounts that can reach up to one million euros.

Some of the research that has received support from the La Caixa Foundation in this call has been led by researchers such as Samuel Sánchez, from the Institute of Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC), who is studying a more efficient way to cure bladder cancer; Toni Gabaldón, from the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona), who is looking for new treatments for candidiasis and other fungal infections, and Hernando A. del Portillo, from the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), who wants to discover how malaria, which predominates in countries like Thailand, becomes more difficult to eradicate because it remains hidden in the bone marrow. In Catalonia, the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG), the August Pi i Sunyer Biomedical Research Institute (Idibaps), the University of Barcelona-Bosch i Gimpera Foundation, and the Institute of Advanced Chemistry of Catalonia (IQAC-CSIC) have also benefited from this call.

Nanorobots to treat bladder cancer

Bladder cancer is the fifth most frequent in Spain and is one of the most expensive to cure because the tumor reappears in 70% of cases. The problem is that existing treatments lose effectiveness because it is very difficult to deliver the drug to tumor cells. Samuel Sánchez proposes to solve this with nanorobots that arrive self-propelled, through the chemical energy generated by the urea in the bladder, which functions as fuel.

Samuel Sánchez proposes to solve it with nanorobots that arrive self-propelled, through the chemical energy generated by the urea in the bladder, which functions as fuel

With the resources obtained through the CaixaResearch Health Research 2021 call, of more than 997,000 euros, Sánchez will be able to test this mechanism in mice, hoping to demonstrate that the nanorobots target diseased cells and stop the tumor. The researcher estimates that this phase of the research will last about three years and, afterwards, if all goes well, it could be studied in people.

How malaria hides in the bone marrow

There are people who develop severe forms of malaria, despite having low levels of this parasite in their blood. One of the hypotheses that researcher Hernando A. del Portillo believes can explain this is that the pathogen hides. Specifically, in the bone marrow and spleen, thanks to nanovesicles that attract it. With the resources obtained, of more than 996,000 euros, Del Portillo will create small models that will imitate these possible hiding places, to study for three years how this parasite gets there and how it can be prevented from remaining hidden, a fact that makes it difficult to eradicate.

New drugs for candidiasis

80% of women will have vaginal candidiasis at some point in their lives, a very annoying and difficult to diagnose type of infection. In most cases, it does not pose a great risk, but when people with a weak immune system are infected, its mortality can reach 50%. The main challenge it poses is that there are not many medicines to cure it and, furthermore, it is a disease that generates a lot of resistance to treatments.

80% of women will have vaginal candidiasis at some point in their lives, a very annoying and difficult to diagnose type of infection

The researcher Toni Gabaldón has received a grant of almost 500,000 euros from the La Caixa Foundation that should allow him, precisely, to study why this infection adapts so quickly to existing drugs, with the aim of detecting how it manages to survive and find a weak point in this process, and test new drugs based on this analysis. Furthermore, the only current treatments for candidiasis are those used for other fungal infections and, therefore, if Gabaldón and her team make a discovery, this solution could also be useful for other diseases.