Think Pink Lux ‘Marian Aldred Award’ awarded to LIH researchers

• Cytoskeleton and Cancer Progression
• Department of Cancer Research
• Cancer
• Donation

On January 13th 2023, Diogo Pereira Fernandes, Master’s student in the Cytoskeleton and Cancer Progression (CCP) group of the Luxembourg Institute of Health (LIH) Department of Cancer Research (DoCR), and Dr Clément Thomas, leader of the research group, were awarded the ‘Marian Aldred Award’ by Think Pink Lux (TPL). The symbolic €25,000 cheque was presented to the two recipients during a ceremony that took place at the LIH premises in Strassen in the presence of Carrie Cannon, Director of TPL, and Laurent Vanot from the TPL committee, husband of the late Marian Aldred.

Thanks to this Marian Aldred Award, Diogo will carry out his research project, which is an integral part of the Master’s training program and consists of exploring the signalling pathway(s) responsible for the emergence of tumour immune resistance. Such knowledge is necessary for development of novel strategies to restore an effective antitumor immune response in patients and improve the efficacy of current immunotherapies, which still fail to elicit an effective and durable response in many patients.

We are thankful to Think Pink Lux and its donors for being active supporters of the translational research we perform within our group. This donation will help to train the next generation of researchers and contribute to a better understanding of how tumour cells evade the immune system

explained Dr Clément Thomas.

Think Pink Lux is delighted to be able to support another young researcher here in Luxembourg. It is also exciting to see how the research landscape in Luxembourg has changed since TPL started in 2009. The meaningful research performed at the LIH has grown to be more and more patient centred, which is very relevant to the TPL community. We wish Diogo the best of luck

added TPL Director Carrie Cannon.

Think Pink Lux (TPL) is a Luxembourg non-profit association started in 2009 by a group of volunteers with the goals of supporting women living in Luxembourg with the day-to-day reality of cancer, and raising awareness about cancers that typically affect women. The ‘Marian Aldred Award’ was launched in 2012 following the untimely death of Marian Aldred, one of the founding members of TPL, from ovarian cancer. The award provides funding to young scientists in support of their cancer research projects.

Since its inception, TPL has been committed to supporting research by providing funding of €63,000 for a PhD student supervised by Dr Marc Diederich at Laboratoire de Biologie Moléculaire et Cellulaire du Cancer and has already donated €141,000 to fund several students at the LIH Department of Oncology under Dr Clément Thomas.