Page 42 - CIBERBBN-2015-eng

Research groups
Cell Therapy Research Group
Programme: Biomaterials & Advanced Therapies Lead Researcher: Blanco Fernández, Jerónimo
Group members
STAFF MEMBERS: Garrido López, Cristina Pilar.
ASSOCIATED MEMBERS: Ramos Romero, Sara | Rubio Vidal, Nuria | Sánchez Cid, Lourdes. CONTRIBUTORS: Aguilar Bohorquez, Elisabeth | Alieva Kraseninnikova, Maria | Meca Cortés, Óscar.
Main lines of research
• TISSUE ENGINEERING: Study of interactions be- tween cells and biomaterials implanted in live an- imals for tissue regeneration. We use an analysis platform based in bioluminescence and fluores- cence procedures, that allows rapid and compar- ative analysis of biomaterials to optimize individ- ualized applications.
• TUMOUR CELL THERAPY: Development of op- timized cell therapies against brain tumors and other types of incurable cancers. The therapy strategy is based on the use of stem cells with tumour homing capacity, that are genetically modified to express a cytotoxic gene (e.g., thymi- dine kinase) that can transform a harmless pro- drug into a cytotoxic agent, inducing localized cell death in the tumour proximity (bystander effect).
• INTERACTION BETWEEN TUMOUR AND THER- APEUTIC CELLS: The objective is to understand the interactions between therapeutic and tumour cells, that lead to the elevated tumour killing ef- fect in our model of bystander therapy. Biolumi- nescence and fluorescence imaging procedures are used to monitor the fate of therapeutic cells and tumours.
• MONITORING CONVENTIONAL TUMOUR THER- APY. The non invasive imaging platform permits the measurement of tumour response to thera- peutic strategies during time, in the same expe- rimental animal, improving data consistency and reproducibility, as well as, savings in animal re- sources.
42 I Annual report 2015 I CIBER-BBN