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Scientists Developing Implant To Cure Cancer In Just 60 Days — With Goal To Slash Death Rates By 50%

There'll be an app for that.

Curing cancer could soon be as easy as a few taps on your mobile, according to a team of scientists at Rice University who have received $45 million in funding for a novel, implant-based treatment system that could cut cancer death rates by 50%.

The funds, granted by the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health, will be used to develop "sense-and-respond implant technology," with the aim to improve the outcomes of immunotherapy treatments for cancers that are usually difficult to treat.

"Instead of tethering patients to hospital beds, IV bags and external monitors, we'll use a minimally invasive procedure to implant a small device that continuously monitors their cancer and adjusts their immunotherapy dose in real time," Omid Veiseh, a Rice bioengineer and principal investigator on the project, said in a statement.

Similarly to diabetes treatments with insulin pumps, the three-inch implant, or "hybrid advanced molecular manufacturing regulator" (HAMMR), would deliver immunotherapy drugs to the patient in a "closed loop" system. The chargeable devices will communicate wirelessly, "potentially with a smartphone," researchers told KHOU 11.

Researchers hope that the implant would be able to cure cancer in as little as two months.Rice University The roughly three-inch implant would both monitor cancer cells and deliver therapy drugs.Brandon Martin/Rice University

Researchers hope that the implant will only be needed for short-term use — eradicating the cancer in as little as 60 days.

"Cancer cells are continually evolving and adapting to therapy. However, currently available diagnostic tools, including radiologic tests, blood assays and biopsies, provide very infrequent and limited snapshots of this dynamic process," Dr. Amir Jazaeri, a co-principal investigator and professor of gynecologic oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, said in a statement.

"As a result, today's therapies treat cancer as if it were a static disease."

Veiseh, right, is leading a team of reachers from 20 labs across the country.Brandon Martin/Rice University

Instead, their technology, which serves as both a cancer monitoring and drug administrating system, will provide "real-time data from the tumor environment that can in turn guide more effective and tumor-informed novel therapies" and, therefore, expedite the treatment process.

"The technology is broadly applicable for peritoneal cancers that affect the pancreas, liver, lungs and other organs," said Veiseh.

The research team is comprised of experts from an array of fields spanning 20 labs in seven states under the project name THOR, which stands for "targeted hybrid oncotherapeutic regulation."

The first clinical trial will investigate the implant's effectiveness for recurrent ovarian cancer. They hope to begin human trials within five years.

The implant would, in theory, monitor cancer cells in real time.Veiseh Lab/Rice University

Last year, Veiseh's team of researchers already demonstrated the effectiveness of the "drug factory" technology in mice with bead-shaped implants that eradicated late-stage ovarian and colorectal cancers in six days.

Now, they're able to "build on that experience" with clinical trials, Veiseh said, with HAMMR as "the next iteration of that approach."

Feds Fund $45 Million Rice-led Research That Could Slash U.S. Cancer Deaths By 50%

image: A prototype of the "hybrid advanced molecular manufacturing regulator," or HAMMR, a "closed-loop," drug-producing implant smaller than an adult's finger that is being developed to treat ovarian, pancreatic and other difficult-to-treat cancers. The implant, which is small enough to be implanted with minimally invasive surgery, will be able to continuously monitor a patient's cancer and adjust their immunotherapy dose in real time. It is under development by a Rice University-led team of researchers from eight universities and two companies in seven states and is supported by a $45 million award from the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health that includes funding for a first-phase clinical trial for recurrent ovarian cancer within five years. View more 

Credit: Credit: Brandon Martin/Rice University

The Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) has awarded $45 million to rapidly develop sense-and-respond implant technology that could slash U.S. Cancer-related deaths by more than 50%.

The award to a Rice University-led team of researchers from seven states will fast-track development and testing of a new approach to cancer treatment that aims to dramatically improve immunotherapy outcomes for patients with ovarian, pancreatic and other difficult-to-treat cancers.

"Instead of tethering patients to hospital beds, IV bags and external monitors, we'll use a minimally invasive procedure to implant a small device that continuously monitors their cancer and adjusts their immunotherapy dose in real time," said Rice bioengineer Omid Veiseh, principal investigator (PI) on the ARPA-H cooperative agreement. "This kind of 'closed-loop therapy' has been used for managing diabetes, where you have a glucose monitor that continuously talks to an insulin pump. But for cancer immunotherapy, it's revolutionary."

Rice President Reginald DesRoches said, "Rice is proud to be the recipient of the second major funding award from the ARPA-H, a new funding agency established last year to support research that catalyzes health breakthroughs. The research Rice bioengineer Omid Veiseh is doing in leading this team is truly groundbreaking and could potentially save hundreds of thousands of lives each year. This is the type of research that makes a significant impact on the world."

The team includes engineers, physicians and multidisciplinary specialists in synthetic biology, materials science, immunology, oncology, electrical engineering, artificial intelligence and other fields spanning 20 different research labs. The project and team are named THOR, an acronym for "targeted hybrid oncotherapeutic regulation." THOR's implant, or "hybrid advanced molecular manufacturing regulator," goes by the acronym HAMMR.

Dr. Amir Jazaeri, a co-PI and professor of gynecologic oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, summarized the clinical need and potential of the technology as follows: "Cancer cells are continually evolving and adapting to therapy. However, currently available diagnostic tools, including radiologic tests, blood assays and biopsies, provide very infrequent and limited snapshots of this dynamic process. As a result, today's therapies treat cancer as if it were a static disease. We believe THOR could transform the status quo by providing real-time data from the tumor environment that can in turn guide more effective and tumor-informed novel therapies."

The THOR team includes 19 co-PIs from Rice, MD Anderson, Georgia Institute of Technology, Stanford University, Carnegie Mellon University, Northwestern University, the University of Houston, Johns Hopkins University, the Chicago-based startup CellTrans and New York City-based Bruder Consulting and Venture Group.

The THOR cooperative agreement includes funding for a first-phase clinical trial of HAMMR for the treatment of recurrent ovarian cancer. The trial is slated to begin in the fourth year of THOR's 5 1/2-year project.

"The technology is broadly applicable for peritoneal cancers that affect the pancreas, liver, lungs and other organs," said Veiseh, an associate professor of bioengineering at Rice and a CPRIT Scholar with the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas. "The first clinical trial will focus on refractory recurrent ovarian cancer, and the benefit of that is that we have an ongoing trial for ovarian cancer with our encapsulated cytokine 'drug factory' technology. We'll be able to build on that experience. We have already demonstrated a unique model to go from concept to clinical trial within five years, and HAMMR is the next iteration of that approach."

The THOR award will be administered through the Rice Biotech Launch Pad, a new medical innovation and commercialization initiative. Directed by Veiseh, the initiative aims to rapidly turn Rice-discovered technologies into medical treatments that cure diseases and improve lives.

THOR is the second program funded under ARPA-H's inaugural Open Broad Agency Announcement solicitation for research proposals. The first is a $24 million project to boost immune cell function led by Emory University that was awarded Aug. 23.

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Video:

https://youtu.Be/FruCjsGvCsgDESCRIPTION: Funded by a $45 million grant from the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health, or ARPA-H, the THOR Project is a first-of-its-kind approach to cancer treatment that aims to dramatically improve immunotherapy outcomes for patients with ovarian, pancreatic and other difficult-to-treat cancers. (Video by Brandon Martin/Rice University)

Image downloads:

https://news-network.Rice.Edu/news/files/2023/09/0925_THOR-053BMar-hammr-lg.JpgCAPTION: A prototype of the "hybrid advanced molecular manufacturing regulator," or HAMMR, a "closed-loop," drug-producing implant smaller than an adult's finger that is being developed to treat ovarian, pancreatic and other difficult-to-treat cancers. The implant, which is small enough to be implanted with minimally invasive surgery, will be able to  continuously monitor a patient's cancer and adjust their immunotherapy dose in real time. It is under development by a Rice University-led team of researchers from eight universities and two companies in seven states and is supported by a $45 million award from the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health that includes funding for a first-phase clinical trial for recurrent ovarian cancer within five years. (Photo by Brandon Martin/Rice University)

https://news-network.Rice.Edu/news/files/2023/09/0925_THOR-HAMMR-fig-lg.JpgCAPTION: A figure illustrating how a "closed-loop" implant called HAMMR (short for "hybrid advanced molecular manufacturing regulator") will be used to treat recurrent ovarian cancer. The implant, which is small enough to be implanted with minimally invasive surgery, is being developed by a Rice University-led team of researchers from eight universities and two companies in seven states. The Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health awarded $45 million to fast-track development of the implant, which includes funding for a first-phase clinical trial within five years. (Figure courtesy of Veiseh Lab/Rice University)

https://news-network.Rice.Edu/news/files/2023/09/0925_THOR-ajov222bm-lg2k.JpgCAPTION: Omid Veiseh (right) and Amir Jazaeri in Veiseh's Rice University laboratory in August 2023. Veiseh is principal investigator on the "targeted hybrid oncotherapeutic regulation" (THOR) project, a $45 million program that the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) is funding to fast-track the development of a small implant that can continuously monitor a patient's cancer and adjust their immunotherapy dose in real time. Veiseh is an associate professor of bioengineering at Rice and a CPRIT Scholar with the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas. Jazaeri, a THOR co-principal investigator, is a professor of gynecologic oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, vice chair for clinical research in MD Anderson's Department of Gynecologic Oncology and Reproductive Medicine and director of MD Anderson's Gynecologic Cancer Immunotherapy Program. (Photo by Brandon Martin/Rice University)

https://news-network.Rice.Edu/news/files/2023/09/0925_THOR-0119Bmar156-Veiseh-lg.JpgCAPTION: Omid Veiseh, an associate professor of bioengineering at Rice University, is the principal investigator on the THOR Project. Short for "targeted hybrid oncotherapeutic regulation," THOR is a $45 million program by the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) to fast-track development of a small implant that can continuously monitor a patient's cancer and adjust their immunotherapy dose in real time. (Photo by Brandon Martin/Rice University)

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THOR investigators:

Omid Veiseh* - Rice University

Isaac Hilton - Rice University

Laura Segatori - Rice University

Oleg Igoshin - Rice University

Jacob Robinson - Rice University

Jonathan Rivnay - Northwestern University

Shana Kelley - Northwestern University

Tzahi Cohen-Karni - Carnegie Mellon University

Rahul Panat - Carnegie Mellon University

Douglas Weber - Carnegie Mellon University

Josiah Hester - Georgia Institute of Technology

Yingyan Lin - Georgia Institute of Technology

Ken Chen - MD Anderson Cancer Center

Amir Jazaeri - MD Anderson Cancer Center

Nathan Reticker-Flynn - Stanford University

Jamie Spangler - Johns Hopkins University

Weiyi Peng - University of Houston

Susan Drapeau - Bruder Consulting

José Oberholzer - Cell Trans

*Principal investigator

Links:

ARPA-H: arpa-h.Gov

Veiseh lab: veisehlab.Rice.Edu

Rice Biotech Launch Pad: biotechlaunchpad.Rice.Edu

Rice Bioengineering: bioengineering.Rice.Edu

George R. Brown School of Engineering: engineering.Rice.Edu

This release can be found online at news.Rice.Edu.

Follow Rice News and Media Relations via Twitter @RiceUNews.

Located on a 300-acre forested campus in Houston, Rice University is consistently ranked among the nation's top 20 universities by U.S. News & World Report. Rice has highly respected schools of Architecture, Business, Continuing Studies, Engineering, Humanities, Music, Natural Sciences and Social Sciences and is home to the Baker Institute for Public Policy. With 4,240 undergraduates and 3,972 graduate students, Rice's undergraduate student-to-faculty ratio is just under 6-to-1. Its residential college system builds close-knit communities and lifelong friendships, just one reason why Rice is ranked No. 1 for lots of race/class interaction and No. 4 for quality of life by the Princeton Review. Rice is also rated as a best value among private universities by Kiplinger's Personal Finance.

Feds Investing Nearly $115 Million In Three New Cancer Technology Research Projects

Cancer detection and treatment research will receive up to $115 million for three projects funded ... [+] under agreements between the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) and Rice University, the University of Missouri, and the Georgia Institute of Technology.

getty

The federal government plans to invest almost $115 million in three university-based projects intended to discover new ways to detect and fight cancer. The three projects are funded under agreements with the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H), representing the Agency's support of the Biden administration's Cancer Moonshot agenda.

The three research centers will be headed up by Rice University, the University of Missouri, and the Georgia Institute of Technology.

"ARPA-H is paving the way for unprecedented and groundbreaking research on cancer. This work will be a pillar in this Administration's ambitious and important goal to cut the cancer death rate in half in 25 years," said HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra, as part of the agency's announcement.

Rice University

Rice University in Houston, Texas will receive up to $45 million to support the development of a new approach that aims to improve immunotherapy outcomes for patients with ovarian, pancreatic and other hard-to-treat cancers.

"Instead of tethering patients to hospital beds, IV bags and external monitors, we'll use a minimally invasive procedure to implant a small device that continuously monitors their cancer and adjusts their immunotherapy dose in real time," said Rice bioengineer Omid Veiseh, principal investigator on the ARPA-H agreement, in a university release. "This kind of 'closed-loop therapy' has been used for managing diabetes, where you have a glucose monitor that continuously talks to an insulin pump. But for cancer immunotherapy, it's revolutionary."

The Rice project, which is named THOR, an acronym for "Targeted Hybrid Oncotherapeutic Regulation," will include engineers, physicians and multidisciplinary specialists in synthetic biology, materials science, immunology, oncology, electrical engineering, artificial intelligence and other fields in 20 different research labs.

In addition to Rice, the THOR team will include investigators from MD Anderson, Georgia Institute of Technology, Stanford University, Carnegie Mellon University, Northwestern University, the University of Houston, Johns Hopkins University, the Chicago-based startup CellTrans and New York City-based Bruder Consulting and Venture Group.

The THOR cooperative agreement includes funding for a first-phase clinical trial of a novel treatment for recurrent ovarian cancer. That trial is scheduled to begin in the fourth year of the 5 1/2-year project.

University of Missouri

The University of Missouri will receive up to $19.9 million to lead a project entitled, "The Synthetic Programmable Bacteria for Immune-directed Killing in Tumor Environments," with the acronym SPIKEs. It aims to develop an inexpensive and safe form of cancer immunotherapy using bacteria that will target solid tumors. Through SPIKEs, researchers intend to engineer bacteria that can recruit, deploy and regulate tumor-targeting immune cells, boosting the body's ability to fight off cancer without the side-effects often accompanying traditional medications.

Georgia Institute of Technology

The third project, led by the Georgia Institute of Technology, will attempt to improve the ability to detect tumors at their earliest stages. It will use synthetic biology and cell engineering to map cancer cell biomarkers and improve cancer early detection, thereby allowing effective clinical treatments when tumors are still small.

With up to $49.5 million in potential funding, the Cancer and Organ Degradome Atlas (CODA) project aims to understand the cellular profiles unique to cancer cells. Out of this research, scientists hope to develop a set of biosensors that can recognize a range of cancer-specific markers and, ultimately, produce highly precise and cost-effective early detection that can spot common cancers when they are most treatable.

The first ARPA-H award was a $24 million agreement with Emory University in August for a project that addresses immune dysregulation by directly programming immune cell function. "Curing the Uncurable via RNA-Encoded Immunogene Tuning" (acronym: CUREIT) will use gene-encoded technology to develop the capability to enhance protective immune responses as well as modulate insufficient or ineffective immune profiles. Researchers believe this technology has the potential to make significant advances in managing or eliminating many diseases that are currently untreatable.

"At ARPA-H, we recognize the urgency of the health challenges facing cancer patients and their families and we are committed to funding truly transformative research that can improve health outcomes for everyone," added ARPA-H Director Renee Wegrzyn, Ph.D, in the announcement of the latest awards. "With these awards, we hope to see crucial advancements in patient-tailored therapies, better and earlier tumor detection methods, and cell therapies that can help the immune system target cancer cells for destruction."

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