NCT06071598

The Role of Lipid Transporter MFSD2A in the Resolution of Colorectal Cancer-associated Inflammation

Status unknown Last updated 6 October 2023

What this trial tests

trial testing Surgical specimens of CRC-affected patients in Colorectal Cancer in 15 participants. Status unknown.

Timeline

15 March 2023

Primary endpoint
15 March 2026

15 March 2026

Quick facts

Lead sponsor	IRCCS San Raffaele
Status	Status unknown
Study type	OBSERVATIONAL
Enrollment	15
Start date	15 March 2023
Primary completion	15 March 2026
Estimated completion	15 March 2026
Sites	1 location across Italy

Drugs / interventions tested

• Surgical specimens of CRC-affected patients

Conditions studied

• Colorectal Cancer — all drugs for Colorectal Cancer →

Sponsor

IRCCS San Raffaele — full company profile →

Who can join

18 and older, any sex, with Colorectal Cancer. Patients with the condition only — healthy volunteers not accepted.

Sponsor's own description

The intrinsic connection between inflammation and tumor promotion is well characterized and is a key pathogenic event in patients with colorectal cancer (CRC), the second most common cause of tumor-related death in western countries. Environmental factors and chronic inflammation represent the major causes of intestinal carcinogenesis. In fact, patients suffering from inflammatory bowel diseases, including Crohn's disease and Ulcerative Colitis (UC), have high risk of developing colitis-associated CRC with poor prognoses. Therefore, targeting the cancer-associated inflammation may offer new avenues for cancer treatment. In fact, several anti-inflammatory drugs, have been used for prophylaxis and have shown efficacy in contrasting cancer, despite various adverse side effects. Thus, there is an urgent need to discover novel cancer-associated mechanisms to develop alternative therapies that may reduce aberrant inflammatory responses without interfering with physiological defenses against infection and functional anti-tumor immunity. A novel approach promoting anti-tumor immunity has been recently proposed after the discovery of potent, endogenous, specialized pro-resolving mediators (SPMs), including lipoxins, resolvins, protectins, and maresins, mainly derived from omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid (PUFA) docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) via COX, LOX and CYP450 pathways, mediated by MFSD2A. Due to the potent bioactivity of SPMs in resolving inflammation and because of the correlation between inflammation and cancer, the roles of these lipid mediators have attracted great attention for their potential therapeutic role in cancer treatment, including CRC. Nevertheless, the understanding of the endogenous mechanisms that limit the inflammatory response during CRC development is incomplete and requires further investigation.

Based on the preliminary results indicating that dysfunctional MFSD2A-dependent pro-resolving pathways may foster CRC development, the investigators aim to define the functional role of MFSD2A in orchestrating pro-resolving pathways in the intestinal endothelium of metastatic and not metastatic CRC patients.

This is a cross-sectional single-center observational study involving patients with CRC. The investigators will enroll 15 patients with colorectal cancer (CRC) stratified by tumor stage (T0 / T1-T4, M0 / M1, N0 / N1 / N2) undergoing surgery in the Gastroenterology and Digestive Endoscopy unit within Gastro Center (IRCCS Ospedale San Raffaele).

Human Intestinal Microvascular Endothelial Cells (HIMEC) will be generated from each sample of cancer surgical specimens, while the healthy cells will be derived from the healthy margins of the colorectal resection of the same CRC patients.

MFSD2A will be overexpressed or silenced and the investigators will evaluate its biological effects in both tumor-derived HIMECs and healthy tissue-derived HIMECs through transcriptomics and lipidomics analysis. The investigators will also exploit a possible novel therapy based on the delivery of MFSD2A encoding plasmid-conjugated liposomes.

Publications & conference data

No peer-reviewed publications indexed yet for this trial.