Cátia Pesquita coordinates LASIGE’s participation in the newly launched CancerScan project. This Horizon Europe-funded initiative aims to enhance personalised cancer treatments by integrating multi-omics data from biopsies with clinical information to better understand how the tumour microenvironment affects treatment outcomes.

Standard protocols often overlook the unique biological complexities of individual tumours. A tumour’s specific cellular and molecular makeup significantly impacts drug resistance and treatment outcomes. However, clinicians currently lack the tools to simulate how a patient’s tumour might respond to specific drugs. CancerScan aims to fill this gap by developing an innovative digital pathology slide scanner capable of generating patient-specific digital twins of tumours.

The project brings together eight partners from six different countries (Spain, Portugal, Italy, Germany, Austria, and Serbia), combining interdisciplinary expertise in biology, artificial intelligence, and hardware engineering to capture tumour communication patterns and translate them into personalised simulations. By integrating this capability directly into diagnostic workflows, CancerScan sets the stage for a new class of decision-support tools that enable clinicians to determine the most effective drug for each patient, including the optimal timing, sequence, and dosage.

The project started this month, August 2025 and will last until July 2028.