Ph.D. student at the group of Jordi Barquinero in the Institute of Oncology Research (Hospital Duran y Reynalds, Barcelona). In 2003, Dr. Teresa Puig was awarded with a nationally-funded-2-year position as a scientist at the Girona Research Institute (MEC; EX2003-1020) to develop her research on Cancer Drug Development in the Division of Medical Oncology at the Catalan Institute of Oncology (Dr. Josep Trueta Hospital) in Girona. In 2006, she was awarded again by the Fund for Scientific Research “Programa Juan de la Cierva” (Junior PI; JCI-2005-1616-1) from Ministry of Science and Technology of Spain to direct the project: “Study and Characterization of the Therapeutic Potential of Novel Fatty Acid Synthase (FASN) Inhibitors in Breast Cancer”. As a Junior PI, she got public and private Grants from the Spanish Instituto de Salud Carlos III (FIS PI082031; RD06-0020-0028; FIS PI11/00692), the Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia y Innovación (MICCN, CIT- 090000-2008-10) and the Spanish Society of Medical Oncology. Results had led to the identification of compounds with relevant anticancer activity, which has resulted in the application for two national patents (P2 01030239, P201231228) and one international patent (P824EP00) transferred to the industry Italfármaco SA in 2009 and three industry contracts with pharmaceutical companies (Wyeth, Pfyzer and Italfármaco). Dr. Puig received three awards in her Junior PI period. Dr. Puig also mentored graduate and post-graduate students from the School of Sciences (University of Girona, Spain) and she was Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology between 2001 and 2008. In 2009 she promoted for a position as Associate Professor in the Medical Sciences Dept. (University of Girona) and as Director of the New Therapeutic Targets Lab (TargetsLab) group.
Her lab operates at the interface between biology, engineering and medicine, where they seek to understand molecular and genetic causes of acquired resistance in breast cancer with the aim to find novel biomarkers and improved therapeutic strategies in this setting. By the nature of her work she has a strong history of with basic science, biomedical engineering, translational researchers and clinicians.
Research Interests of the Group
The current efforts of TargetsLab are focused on the design and utilization of molecular and technological tools for targeting particularly breast cancer progression and recurrence and misregulated wound healing processes. For studying and understanding such complex processes we focused our efforts in:
- Preclinical (sensitive and chemoresistant cellular models, tumoroids and ortoxenopatients) and clinical (patient tumor samples) models for the evaluation of novel biomarkers (proteins, genes or epigenetic markers) to develop and test synthetic anti-cancer compounds (or novel treatment approaches) for those patients who have progressed to breast cancer.
- Design and manufacture several three-dimensional (3D) structures to implement 3D culture of preclinical TNBC models (cells and tumoroids) to enrich and isolate breast cancer stem cells (BCSCs).
Research projects financed in the last five years
Research projects:
TITLE: Pre-clinical characterization of fatty acid synthase (FASN) inhibition in anti-HER2 drug-resistant models
FINANCING ENTITY: Instituto de Salud Carlos III (PI11/00692)
DURATION: 3 year FROM:2012 UNTIL:2015
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: Teresa Puig
TITLE: Grup consolidate: Research group in technological innovation to productive systems.
FINANCING ENTITY: Direcció General de Recerca. Generalitat of Catalunya (SGR2017-00385)
DURATION: 3 year FROM:2014 UNTIL:2016
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: Joaquim Ciurana
TITLE: Development of new antitumor drugs with high efficiency and specificity and low toxicity for oral administration
FINANCING ENTITY: Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (RTC-2014-2589-1)
DURATION: 3 years FROM: 2015 UNTIL: 2018
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: Teresa Puig
TITLE: The inhibition of the lipogenic enzyme fatty acid synthase (FASN) as a new therapeutic strategy for the treatment of triple negative breast cancer
FINANCING ENTITY: Fundación Ramón Areces
DURATION: 3 year FROM:2015 UNTIL:2018
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: Teresa Puig
TITLE: Preclinical characterization of the inhibition of fatty acid metabolism in triple negative breast cancer models
FINANCING ENTITY: Instituto de Salud Carlos III (PI14/00329)
DURATION: 3 years FROM: 2015 UNTIL:2018
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: Teresa Puig
Contracts:
TITLE: Fatty Acid Synthase (FASN) inhibition: an alternative strategy to overcome resistance to EGFR Tyrosine Kinase Inhibitors in Non-squamous Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer
FINANCING ENTITY: AstraZeneca Co.
DURATION: 1 year FROM: 2017 UNTIL:2018
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: Teresa Puig
TITLE: Fatty Acid Synthase (FASN) inhibition: an alternative strategy to overcome resistance to EGFR Tyrosine Kinase Inhibitors in Non-squamous Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer (II)
FINANCING ENTITY: AstraZeneca Co.
DURATION: 3 years FROM: 2019 UNTIL:2021
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: Teresa Puig
Stays in foreign centers
Visitant Professor at Perlmutter Cancer Center in Langone Medical Center and University of New York, New York, USA 2018.
Ph.D Student at Centro de Investigaciones Medioambientals. Energéticas y Tecnológicas (CIEMAT) / Hematopoiesis Group, Madrid, Spain 1999