Christopher LaRocca
University of Minnesota, MN·Medicine & Clinical Research·Early-career
Colorectal cancer is one of the most common causes of cancer death in the United States and worldwide. Over half of patients develop metastatic disease during their illness, most often in the liver or in the lining of the abdomen, called the peritoneum.
- Fields
Medicine & Clinical Research
Microbiology & Immunology
Pharmacology
- Topics
colorectal cancer
oncolytic adenovirus
oncolytic virus
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jun 2030
What they work on
- Identify which viral fiber structure, the part that attaches the virus to a cell, and which promoter, the genetic switch driving replication, give the strongest and most selective infection of human colorectal cancer cells, using cancer cell lines and patient-derived tissue slices.
- Test in mouse models whether the sodium iodide symporter carried by the virus drives enough uptake of the radioactive tracer 124I to allow PET/CT whole-body imaging of colorectal tumors and of where the virus has spread.
- Determine whether pairing the optimized virus with therapeutic radioactive iodine (131I) increases tumor killing, using mice bearing patient-derived colorectal tumors grown both under the skin and at the organ site where the cancer naturally arises.
- Evaluate viral replication, spread through the body, and toxicity in intact animals, where tumor microenvironment and whole-organism physiology shape outcomes in ways cell culture cannot reproduce.
More about the research
Surgical removal offers the best hope of long-term survival, yet fewer than a quarter of these patients are candidates for surgery when they first present. For those who cannot have surgery and whose tumors do not respond to standard chemotherapy, options are limited, so new kinds of treatment are needed.
Why it matters
Patients with metastatic colorectal cancer who cannot undergo surgery and do not respond to chemotherapy currently have few effective treatments. A virus that both kills colorectal tumor cells and concentrates radioactive iodine in them could offer a combined therapy and imaging strategy, letting clinicians see where treatment has reached while delivering radiation to tumors. The findings may support later testing of this approach in colorectal cancer patients.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Rui Wang
Case Western Reserve University, OH·Pharmacology
Determine whether LRG1 secreted by liver endothelial cells drives colorectal cancer liver metastases to start and grow, using mice lacking endothelial LRG1 and an LRG1-neutralizing antibody.
Shiaowen Hsu
Duke University, NC·Medicine & Clinical Research
Test whether minimal residual disease cells from colorectal cancer patients that resist standard-of-care chemotherapy are more likely to metastasize and cause recurrence, using MicroOrganoSpheres grown from portal venous blood collected during surgery.
Kevin Van Der Jeught
University of Miami, FL·Microbiology & Immunology
Generate and characterize mouse, human and cross-reactive nanobodies against ST2, the IL-33 receptor, and measure their ability to bind and block ST2 as candidates for colorectal cancer imaging and therapy.
The school
University of Minnesota: 88 labs on PI Pages, $1.4B a year on research, 722 research doctorates a year.
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