🧵1/3 How do immune cells behave inside a lung tumour? Researchers at VUB combined SEPARATE-Seq and spatial transcriptomics to create a multiomics map of the lung tumour immune landscape. Their findings provide new insights into cancer biology and support the development of future immunotherapies. ⬇️

🚨 New paper alert: We developed a patient-relevant orthotopic mouse #lungcancer model and combined SEPARATE-Seq together with targeted #spatialtranscriptomics to map the immune landscape and uncovered important specialized immune niches. Read it here 👉 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

One week left to register for the FEBS Advanced Course on Tumour Microenvironment: From Tumour Heterogeneity to Therapy Resistance. which will be held in May 4-8, 2026, in Crete! 🧑‍🔬 🧪 🔬 There is an excellent line up of internationally recognized speakers! tumourmicroenvironment2026.febsevents.org

FEBS Advanced Lecture Course 2026 - Tumour microenvironment: From tumour heterogeneity to therapy resistance

4–8 May 2026 │ Fodele, Greece

tumourmicroenvironment2026.febsevents.org

Last day of #THPT25 — and definitely not the least! Captivating talk by Celine Valot from the Curie Institute, spotlighting her research on how epigenomic changes in luminal cells contribute to the early onset of breast cancer. An inspiring highlight as we continue through the day!

Curious about MATRACs and their potential in cancer therapy? Check out this short video poster pitch from our PostDoc Federica at #THPT25 to learn how this emerging approach could make a difference! www.linkedin.com/feed/update/...

#thpt25 #tumorimmunology #cytokinetherapy #immunoengineering #cancerimmunity #vib #postdoclife #vibconf | VIB Training & Conferences

⚡ 𝗖𝗮𝗻 𝘄𝗲 𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗮 𝘂𝗻𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗮𝗹 𝗳𝗲𝗮𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝘀𝗼𝗹𝗶𝗱 𝘁𝘂𝗺𝗼𝗿𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝗱𝗲𝗹𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝗶𝗺𝗺𝘂𝗻𝗶𝘁𝘆-𝗯𝗼𝗼𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗻𝗮𝗹𝘀 𝗲𝘅𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗹𝘆 𝘄𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝘆’𝗿𝗲 𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗱𝗲𝗱? To answer this, we spoke with Federica Cappellesso at #THPT25, who works in the...

linkedin.com

Always proud to see our lab so well represented at a conference! Our PhD researchers Lize and Alicia, along with Postdoc Federica, presented their work during the poster sessions. Come meet them to get the latest updates on our research at #THPT25!

Beautiful talk by @obenaufa.bsky.social at #THPT25 — first walking us through the key conclusions of her latest Nature paper, then offering a glimpse into the next chapter of her work unravelling the mysteries of drug tolerant persistent cells. Looking forward to see where this story goes next!

After an insightful morning focused on metastasis, we open the afternoon with a mindblowing talk of Jennifer Wargo. She discussed how microbiota can influence immunotherapy responses and the impact of fibers. To say it in her words: "The issue is in the tissue and the scoop is in the poop!" #THPT25

Continuing the interesting talks at VIB #THPT25. Leanne Li discussed the heterogeneity and metabolic interplay in SCLC, showing that survival increases when blocking electrical activity in neuroendocrine cells. Great example of how fundamental insights can give rise to new therapeutic approaches!

What an excellent way to kick of the #THPT25 conference! Keynote Johanna Joyce showed her latest insights in the complexity of the TME and talked about her promising results on preventing scar formation in brain cancer to reduce relapse and improve survival. @vibtrainconf.bsky.social

The Tumor Heterogeneity, Plasticity and Therapy Conference #THPT25 is almost here!⏰Registration closes Nov 26th vibbio.tech/THPT25. Don't miss this chance to hear more from Leanne Li (The Francis Crick Institute, UK) who focuses on combining cancer biology and neuroscience @leanneli.bsky.social

🎯 New speaker alert: Jennifer Wargo (MD Anderson Cancer Center, US) will share cutting-edge advances in precision, genetically targeted cancer therapies at the THPT Conference. 📍 Leuven | 🗓️ 10–12 Dec | #THPT25 🔗 Early bird registration deadline: 29 October vibbio.tech/THPT25

The Tumor Heterogeneity, Plasticity & Therapy Conference welcomes Céline Vallot (@institutcurie.bsky.social) to share her research on epigenomic evolution of breast cancers at single-cell resolution. 📍 Leuven | 📅 10–12 Dec | #THPT25 ⏳ Early bird registration deadline: 29 October vibbio.tech/THPT25

🎉 Not 1, but 2 prizes! Huge congrats to our team members for their outstanding achievements at the 7th Research Day on Tumor Immunology and Immunotherapy! 🏆 Alicia Gordun Pero–Poster Prize 🎤 Pauline Bardet–Selected Talk Prize We’re proud to see their hard work and research being recognized 👏

At the Tumor Heterogeneity, Plasticity and Therapy Conference (#THPT25) in Leuven from 10–12 December, Eduard Batlle from IRB Barcelona will show how the tumor microenvironment can facilitate immune evasion and metastasis. Abstract deadline: 8th of October vibbio.tech/THPT25

The Laoui Lab will be well represented at the Tumor Heterogeneity, Plasticity and Therapy (3rd edition) conference #THPT25! Join us to hear more about therapy resistence in #cancer from Anna Obenauf @obenaufa.bsky.social Submit your abstract by the 8th of October on vibbio.tech/THPT25

🚨 New publication! In a collaborative effort led by Etherna, we reveal how two optimized LNPs trigger distinct IgG2a vs IgG1 phenotypes. This opens the door to tuning LNP design for tailored immune responses in mRNA vaccines & beyond. advanced.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Next‐Generation Bio‐Reducible Lipids Enable Enhanced Vaccine Efficacy in Malaria and Primate Models

Structure–activity relationship (SAR) optimization of bio-reducible ionizable lipids enables the development of highly effective lipid nanoparticle (LNP) mRNA vaccines. Lead LNPs show superior tolera...

advanced.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

Watching students grow into independent scientists is the best part of this job. Huge congrats to my first PhD student @matekiss.bsky.social stating his onw lab!

Máté Kiss@matekiss.bsky.social · last yr.

Happy to share that I’ll be starting my lab as a junior group leader at the Georg-Speyer-Haus in Frankfurt in 2026. We’ll study how transcriptional regulators control neutrophil function in cancer. I’ll be hiring soon (PhD/lab tech), please reach out if you know someone interested!

Our new paper is out: Tumors don’t just reprogram monocytes locally. We show in a mouse model that the systemic impact of a tumor can alter the epigenome of peripheral monocytes, repressing IFN-responsive regulatory elements and priming pro-tumor gene programs.

Epigenomic preconditioning of peripheral monocytes determines their transcriptional response to the tumor microenvironment - Genome Medicine

Background Monocytes are recruited to tumors and undergo transcriptional reprogramming resulting in tumor-promoting functions. Epigenomic features, such as post-translational modification of histones ...

genomemedicine.biomedcentral.com

I am grateful to co-lead authors Laszlo Halasz and Eva Hadadi, and everyone involved from the labs of Jo Van Ginderachter, Laszlo Nagy, and Damya Laoui (@laouimmunology.bsky.social‬).

Day 3 at #INCI25 @movahedilab.bsky.social presented some fantastic images of brain immune niches as well as their recently published work in @cp-immunity.bsky.social on microglia replacement therapy. After the break, Christoph Scheiermann reminded us how much our day-night cycle impact immunity

Last presenter of the day at #INCI25, Michele De Palma presented some impressive results exploiting cytokine-armed dendritic cell progenitors as cancer therapy in anti-PD1 refractory lung cancer. Now up to enjoy our boat tour in the beautiful Bruges and socialize with our fellow-scientists!

We finish the Cell Therapy session at #INCI25 with two top speakers. First, Tobias Weiss provided an overview of the next-generation therapies for glioblastoma from antibody-cytokine fusion proteins to cytokine-expressing CAR-T cells and exploiting macrophages as drug delivery platform.

After presenting my poster at #INCI25 about the potential of CD40 agonist to enhance anti tumor immunity of tumor-derived cDCs, the session started with an excellent talk by Gabriele Bergers about the key role of the diva’s of endothelial cells, the high endothelial venules in anti-tumor immunity!

Day 2 at #INCI25 started with a great neuro-immuno crosstalk session. As selected abstract, VIB Alumni Ilaria Decimo showed us her exciting work uncovering that TAMs can promote neuronal growth and can be exploited to restore functional motor recovery in a mouse model of spinal cord injury!

Another great talk by Pablo Vargas @leukomotion.bsky.social at #INCI25! His strategy, question the lack of hereditary immunodeficiencies linked to leukocyte motility! The DNA damage protein ATM came out as unexpected candidate with ATM inhibition reducing leukocyte motility in 3D matrices

After some lunch and the first poster session, we are ready for the afternoon session with my fellow conference reporters to report back on the most interesting talks at #INCI25. So follow @tommasoscolaro.bsky.social and @vibtrainconf.bsky.social to learn about the newest hot topics!

We finished our first extremely interesting morning session at #INCI25! As selected abstract, @gretamattavelli.bsky.social from the @riedel-lab.bsky.social was the last to present her PhD work on the role of lymph nodes in metastasis formation before the break!

Ready for a full day of interesting talks at the Immune Niches in Cancer and Inflammation #INCI25 conference in the beautiful Bruges 🙂 @viblifesciences.bsky.social

Very proud of Pauline Bardet, PhD student in our lab for not only presenting her work on SEPARATE-Seq as a new method to characterise our novel orthotopic lung cancer model at the VIB seminar, but also winning the prize for best presentation👏 @viblifesciences.bsky.social #scRNAseq #cancerresearch