Post-doctoral position in Cancer Immunotherapy/Tumor microenvironment

Deciphering the spatial distribution of purinergic checkpoints and validate the next generation anti-cancer therapies
Employer: A 30month post-doctoral position funded by a grant from Fondation pour la Recherche sur le Cancer (TRANSCAN joint Transnational Call) to work on the Pur-Ther project in the group headed by Dr Valérie VOURET-CRAVIARI at the Institute of Cancer and Aging in Nice (IRCAN, France), in close collaboration with a European consortium composed of leaders in the field of purinergic signaling and development of innovative therapeutic tools.
Scientific goal: Based on our previous studies, we proposed that purinergic checkpoints and eATP-targeting represent the basis of new therapies to cure lung cancers. The post-doctoral fellow will participate in the interdisciplinary collaborative project to improve our understanding on the expression and function of key purinergic signaling checkpoints (PC: P2RX7, CD39, CD73 and A2AR) in human lung adenocarcinoma and exploit PC-targeted nanobodies to cure lung cancer. The missions of the post-doctoral fellow will be to characterize the expression and function of PC using digital spatial profiling approaches, to optimize the 3D-culture conditions of human lung tumor organoids and to investigate the efficacy of classical immunotherapies combined to PC-targeting nanobodies in both 3D tumor organoids and lung tumor mouse models.
Candidate profile/Required skills: The successful candidate will have a recent PhD in cell biology with a solid background knowledge in cell culture and cytometry.
The candidate will be highly motivated, autonomous, and scientifically curious.
Habilitation to perform experiments on animals is mandatory, previous experience on 3D-culture would be a plus. Good communication skills in English or French are required.
Research environment: The candidate will work with the PI Valérie Vouret-Craviari in the team headed by Prof P. Hofman. Within the purinergic signaling group, the candidate will collaborate with a graduate student and a technician. The candidate will establish strong collaboration with the European partners of the project: Profs E. Adinolfi and A. Tesei (univ of Ferrara, Italy) Prof S. Adriouch (Univ of Rouen), Prof K Wesel and Dr P. Bannas (Univ Medical center of Hamburg, Germany). The candidate will benefit from IRCAN technical core facilities (https://ircan.org, BIOBANK, Animal facility, Cytometry, Histology, Imaging, Genomics, etc).