The development of resistance to cancer therapy is one of the most frequent reasons for the failure of cancer treatments. Therapy resistance is linked to tumor-recurrence, with devastating consequences for the clinical outcome in the respective patients. It also represents a huge economic burden for public healthcare systems. The understanding of mechanisms causing therapy resistance, and the development of strategies directed towards the re-sensitization of resistant tumor cells to cancer therapy, represents one of the most important challenges to modern cancer research.

The project will develop a shared platform for the identification of drugs capable of re-sensitizing resistant tumors to conventional oncological treatments, through the repositioning of drugs already approved for the treatment of other pathologies. Furthermore, P-CARE will implement strategies of precision medicine, aiming to overcome resistance to anti-cancer immunotherapy by reproducing the immune response of the tumor-microenvironment in vitro. P-CARE will build an efficient trans-border network for sharing technology and knowledge that will be made accessible to academic and clinical cancer research in and outside the program area.

P-Care is funded by the European Union, the ERDF (European Regional Development Fund) and Interreg V-A Italia-Austria 2014-2020.

Total volume: 838,556.- Euro (ADSI 180,000.- Euro)

Duration: 2020 – 2023

Project partners:

• UNITS Universita degli studi di Triest
• UNIUD Universita degli studi di Udine
• ADSI Austrian Drug Screening Institute GmbH
• MUI Medizinische Universität Innsbruck
• SABES Azienda Sanitaria dell’Alto Adige – Comprensorio sanitario di Bolzano