On Wednesday, October 18, during a ceremony at the National Assembly, the Pink Ribbon Association honored the ten laureates of its 2023 Pink Ribbon Awards. The evening was marked by the presence of the Association’s President, Yaël Braun-Pivet, and Leïla Kaddour-Boudadi, who served as the mistress of ceremonies.
Despite the continuous advancements in medical research, one in eight women continues to be affected by breast cancer. Research plays a fundamental role in early detection, treatment, support, and recovery from this devastating disease.
Progress in the medical and scientific fields aims to deepen our understanding of breast cancers and their origins, with the goal of improving treatments and preventive measures. Since 2003, the Pink Ribbon Association has been committed to supporting the projects of researchers, doctors, and associations, thus contributing to the fight against breast cancer.
One of the distinguished laureates of these prestigious awards is Flavio Maina, a CNRS research director at the Marseille Cancer Research Center, who has been co-directing the “Targeting Signalling Networks and Microenvironment in Cancer” team since July 2023.
One of the team’s projects is to investigate how distinct and clinically relevant anticancer agents induce specific immune remodeling in the tumor microenvironment, depending on their mode of action on cancer cells. This project is based on the hypothesis that different anticancer agents could differentially modify communication between cancer cells and immune cells. This research could provide insights for optimizing the combination of anticancer agents and immunotherapies based on changes in the immune signature and the mechanism of action of drugs targeting cancer cells.
Decrypting the interactions between cancer cells and immune cells during treatment could, in the long run, pave the way for the development of new therapeutic approaches to combat triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC), which is particularly complex, aggressive, and resistant to available treatments.
The “Ruban Rose” Awards 2023 celebrate the commitment of researchers like Flavio Maina, who, along with the team members, is dedicated to researching vulnerabilities in breast cancers to identify combinatorial treatments targeting these vulnerabilities.