Neutrophils abundantly infiltrate the tumor microenvironment of various solid tumors and pose a potential target for therapeutic intervention to reprogram the immunosuppressive TME. However, several different tumor-associated neutrophil populations exist with poorly characterized phenotypic states and functions, which can be tumor-promoting or tumor-restraining. The challenge of Team NST is to better understand neutrophil context-specific functions and their contributions to immunosuppression and therapy resistance.

Our team will identify novel therapeutic vulnerabilities in neutrophils to target therapy-resistant neutrophil-high tumor microenvironment states for direct tumor killing. To uncover novel therapeutic targets harnessing neutrophil functions, we will be mimicking unique tumor microenvironment states in vitro by implementing a versatile platform and further investigate the neutrophil-centric cell-cell communication networks in tumors by integrating single cell RNA-sequencing and spatial transcriptomics data sets.