In this series of webinars brought to you by the Cancer Research UK Convergence Science Centre at Imperial College London and The Institute of Cancer Research, London, researchers across the two organisations will discuss key challenges facing cancer research and opportunities for new convergence science approaches to address these. Join us to consider how novel approaches and technologies could shed light on unresolved problems in cancer biology, to innovate new ways to address challenges in cancer and bring pioneering treatments to cancer patients faster.

Hosted by the Convergence Science Centre's Scientific Director Professor Axel Behrens, the series aims to support the Centre's mission to facilitate collaboration between traditionally separate and distinct disciplines.

Please join us on Thursday 16^th June, from 15.00-16.00, for a talk from:

Dr Alex Ivanov – Department of Chemistry, Imperial College London

"Nanoscale Strategies for Single-Molecule and Single Cell Analysis"

There has been a significant drive to deliver nanotechnology-based solutions that allow the analysis of the fundamental building blocks of life, both at the scale of single molecules and individual cells. In this talk, I will present nanoscale sensors and platforms that we have recently developed towards addressing central challenges both for single-molecule and single-cell analysis. This includes nanopore-based single-molecule strategies that enable high sensitivity and selectivity for trace analyte detection in biological fluids and have implications for next-generation biomarker analysis in the laboratory and clinical setting. Examples include introducing analyte selectivity in solid-state nanopores via molecular carrier probes, ^1,2,3 functionalization with embedded receptors in ionic field effect transistors^4,5  and the fabrication of quantum tunnelling probes for nucleic acis and protein analysis.

I will also report on a type of nanotweezers capable of trapping and extracting single entities such as DNA, RNA and mitochondria from a living biological cell that could help better understand the fundamentals of cellular processes and how these processes occur in real-time ⁸. This work bridges the gap between single-molecule/organelle manipulation and cell biology and can ultimately enable a better understanding of living cells.

[1] Sze et al., Nature Communications 2017, 8, 1552

[2] Cai et al., Nature Communications 2019, 10 (1), 1797

[3] Cai et al., Nature Communications 2021, 12, 3515

[4] Ren et al., Advanced Materials 2021 33 (38), 2103067

[5] Ren et al., Nature Communications 2017, 8, 586

[6] Ren et al., Small Methods 2020, 4, 11, 2000356

[7] Tang et al., Nature Communications 2021, 12, 913

[8] Nadappuram et al., Nature Nanotechnology 2019 14, 80

 &

Prof Luca Magnani – Department of Surgery & Cancer, Imperial College London

"Tumor dormancy and cancer evolution: a breast cancer perspective"

Hormone dependent breast cancer (HDBC) is the most commonly diagnosed malignancy in women. Early diagnosis and targeted treatments have had a great impact on survival rates, however, there is still a lot to be done to reach 100% curative rates. One key issue is to understand how HDBC cells adapt to treatment.

My laboratory studies non-genetic mechanisms of cancer evolution and how they allow cancer cells to escape therapy induced dormancy and drive tumour relapse. In this presentation I will highlight the wide array of convergent science strategies we use to investigate this problem.