AIRC — My First AIRC Grant (MFAG 2024)A point-of-care platform for personalized cancer immunotherapy
Biologic drugs, therapeutic monoclonal antibodies such as immune checkpoint inhibitors, have transformed cancer care. Yet they are still dosed largely one-size-fits-all: the actual drug concentration in each patient’s blood can vary widely, and some patients develop anti-drug antibodies that silently neutralize the therapy. Measuring these levels today requires centralized laboratories, specialized immunoassays and days of waiting, so in routine practice, it is rarely done at all.
With the support of a five-year My First AIRC Grant from Fondazione AIRC per la ricerca sul cancro (MFAG 2024, 2025–2029, and ID. 30591 project), our lab is developing a generalizable electrochemical DNA-based (eDNA) point-of-care platform that changes this: single-step sensors that quantify therapeutic monoclonal antibodies, the anti-drug antibodies raised against them, and total IgG, directly in a drop of blood, in minutes, at the patient’s side. Because the platform is modular, adapting it to a new antibody therapy requires swapping a recognition element, not redesigning the assay. Our goal is to make each measurement so fast, cheap and accessible that therapy can be tailored to the individual patient, maximizing efficacy, catching loss of response early, and reducing both toxicity and the cost of these expensive drugs.
Industrial partnership — CSEM (Switzerland)From molecular chemistry to real-world devices
Translational research also means being the laboratory that industry calls when the data has to be right. We provide expert scientific services to CSEM (Centre Suisse d’Électronique et de Microtechnique), one of Europe’s leading technology innovation centres, supporting the development of continuous molecular monitoring technologies within the FemTrack InnoSwiss project.
Drawing on our experience with electrochemical aptamer-based sensing, from raw voltammetric signals to calibration and accuracy in real biological samples, we deliver the independent, rigorous validation that carries a sensing technology from promising prototype towards a trustworthy medical device.
PROJECTS
Continuous monitoring of therapeutic antibodies
AIRC — My First AIRC Grant 2024€500,000
COORDINATOR
An electrochemical DNA-based platform to measure therapeutic monoclonal antibodies, anti-drug antibodies and total IgG directly in biological fluids, bringing therapeutic drug monitoring of biologics within reach of the point of care.
FemTrack — continuous hormone monitoring
Innosuisse, Swiss Innovation Agency, with CSEM€50,000
PI of the Tor Vergata Service unit
Aptamer-based electrochemical sensors for hormone monitoring, developed with CSEM and moved from the laboratory bench onto miniaturised printed devices.
Biosensing for space biomedicine
Agenzia Spaziale Italiana (ASI) - "PRE-ALERT"€260,000
PI Research Unit
Adapting continuous biosensing to the constraints of spaceflight (small volumes, no reagent handling, autonomous operation) so that repeated molecular measurements become possible in orbit to check the mental and physical state of astronauts.
Entropic DNA Sensors
Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship (H2020-MSCA-IF-2020), 2021–2023
Principal Investigator
Biosensors built on structure-switching receptors have a fixed useful dynamic range, which often does not overlap the concentration range the target actually spans in patients. In this project we engineered intrinsically disordered domains into DNA aptamers, using entropic allostery as a general and programmable way to tune their affinity and signal gain. The approach was applied to electrochemical DNA sensors for the real-time, calibration-free monitoring of clinically relevant molecules such as doxorubicin, glucose and phenylalanine.