A GENyO researcher receives funding from the ‘la Caixa’ Foundation to advance new cancer therapies.

The researcher Mari Carmen Ortega Liébana, member of the NANOCHEMBIO group of the Pfizer-University of Granada-Junta de Andalucía Centre for Genomics and Oncology Research (GENyO) and the Pharmaceutical and Organic Chemistry Department of the University of Granada (UGR), has been selected as a beneficiary of one of the prestigious Junior Leader 2024 postdoctoral grants in its Retaining modality, awarded by the “la Caixa” Foundation. This grant has been awarded to only 15 researchers in this edition, being this researcher the only one to receive it in an Andalusian institution. It should be noted that no one from the University of Granada has received this grant in this category since 2019.

The grant, endowed with 305,100 euros, will allow Dr. Ortega Liébana to develop an innovative project over the next three years at the GENyO centre. Her research focuses on the development of CAR-T cells that will act as ‘micropharmacies’, capable of releasing therapeutic agents in the tumour microenvironment in a controlled and selective manner. This strategy, which combines three scientific areas (nanomedicine, biological chemistry and immunology), seeks to improve the efficacy of cell therapies, overcoming the limitations of conventional cancer treatments and moving towards greater clinical applicability in solid tumours.

“GENyO is becoming a leader in the field of research excellence and this postdoctoral Junior Leader Fellowship from the ‘La Caixa’ Foundation is another example of the achievements of a young centre such as ours and its researchers” Prof. Marta Alarcón, Scientific Director of GENyO.

‘I am very excited to receive this recognition and to carry out my research in a centre of excellence such as the GENyO Centre as a Junior Leader Fellow of the ’La Caixa” Foundation. I will continue to do my best to contribute to the development of new nanotechnological and chemical tools to promote advanced therapies for the treatment of cancer. All this will be possible thanks to being part of a fantastic group of exceptional scientists and collaborators to push the boundaries of scientific knowledge” Dr. Mari Carmen Ortega Liébana.

International and multidisciplinary career

Dr. Mari Carmen Ortega Liébana has a multidisciplinary background in nanoscience, chemistry, biocatalysis and biomedicine, acquired throughout her scientific career in various international institutions. Since April 2022, her research has focused on the application of nanotechnology and bioorthogonal chemistry in medicine to improve the efficacy of cancer treatments. At the beginning of 2024, she started to consolidate her scientific career and to push forward her line of research at the GENyO centre, after receiving funding as a principal investigator as an emerging group leader.

One of this young researcher’s great aspirations is to develop translational scientific projects with clinical application, an effort recognised in different scientific entrepreneurship programmes, such as the Entrepreneurial Programme of Cancer Research UK, Panacea Innovation, Converge and Spin-Up Science. In recent years, it has also obtained funding through highly competitive European programmes, including RyC2023, PID2023, FEDER-UGR-2023, María Zambrano 2021, MRC-P2D Award, WT iTPA 2021, IGMM Award 2020, and MSCA-IF-2018.

Scholarships from the ‘la Caixa’ Foundation: a first-class opportunity.

The ‘la Caixa’ Foundation has awarded 100 new PhD and post-doctoral scholarships to excellent researchers to carry out their projects at universities and research centres in Spain and Portugal. With the INPhINIT doctoral scholarships and Junior Leader postdoctoral scholarships, the ‘la Caixa’ Foundation pursues the dual objective of retaining and attracting talent to promote research excellence in these countries. In this call, more than 21 million euros have been allocated to fund 100 researchers from 19 different countries, selected in a highly competitive process.

The Junior Leader grants of the “la Caixa” Foundation not only guarantee solid funding, but also include a comprehensive training programme in leadership, innovation and professional development, promoting the scientific independence of the beneficiary researchers.

As for the grantees, 53 are Spanish and 47 come from other countries, with Italy being the most represented country with 15 selected, followed by Portugal (8) and Germany (4). The grants have been distributed among nearly 60 research centres and universities in Spain and Portugal, with special emphasis on disciplines such as molecular biology, biochemistry, theoretical physics and computational biology.