Personalising therapy to combat lung cancer

Dr Mara's grant is funded by Cure Cancer in 2023

She is based at WEHI (Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research).

Dr Mara Zeissig is a Victoria Cancer Agency/Lung Foundation Australia Low Survival Cancer Philanthropic Early Career Research Fellow at WEHI. Originally from Argentina, Dr Mara moved to Australia when she was 8 years old. She had always been fascinated by medicine, veterinary medicine and medical research, which meant that her inclination for cancer research came naturally. 

Her mother had been a reproductive biology researcher who eventually made the difficult decision to leave academia due to funding challenges. It was no wonder that she was hesitant about her daughter’s career goals. 

“Luckily, I managed to convince her that being a researcher in Australia is a tough but worthwhile career choice. The potential impact I could make for patients, their families and the wider community is something worth striving for,” she says. 

In 2020, she completed her PhD on multiple myeloma at The University of Adelaide and in the last 2 years, developed an interest in the use of immunotherapy and targeted therapies that enhance the immune system to treat solid cancers like lung cancer.

KRAS-mutant lung cancer

In 2022, an estimated 14,529 people were diagnosed with lung cancer, which is the leading cause of cancer-related death in Australia and worldwide. Despite its low survival rates, lung cancer remains one of the most underfunded cancer types. 

Lung cancers with KRAS gene mutations are aggressive and tend to be diagnosed at late stages of the disease. Sadly, patients with KRAS-mutant lung cancers face one of the lowest survival outcomes of any cancer type - on average  2 years post-diagnosis. 

KRAS-mutant lung cancers respond poorly to conventional therapies like immunotherapy. They are very difficult to treat as there are multiple subtypes with unique tumour characteristics that affect the effectiveness of treatment.

Dr Mara Zeissig's research

In 2021, the first drug to target the KRAS gene (Sotorasib) entered clinical trials. However, it’s still unclear which KRAS-mutant lung cancer subtypes will respond to KRAS inhibitors (as not all of them will) and which combination of drugs should be used alongside the inhibitors to benefit patients. 

Dr Mara’s research aims to identify tailored and more effective treatments by testing a  new KRAS inhibiting drug called MRTX1133 against common KRAS-mutant lung cancer subtypes to discover which subtypes respond the best to the therapy. Her research also aims to determine whether combined treatment with immunotherapy, which uses the immune system to fight cancer, can successfully kill tumours. 

Ultimately, Dr Mara hopes her findings will be translated into clinical practice as soon as possible so that oncologists can deliver more effective therapies and improve patients’ quality of life. As KRAS mutations commonly occur in pancreatic and colorectal cancers, her findings could benefit patients living with those cancers, too.

The impact of cancer research funding

Dr Mara is grateful for her Cure Cancer grant, which will provide her with the opportunity to launch into her independent research career and expand her collaborative networks with other cancer researchers..

“The Cure Cancer grant will provide the crucial initial funding to conduct early-stage research that will help progress my career and also significantly improve my chances of receiving future funding in a competitive environment. 

“This will allow me to pursue junior faculty positions with the goal of forming my own laboratory and continue to improve cancer treatments through innovative and translational research.

“There are few jobs where every day is different, where you can be curious and creative, and where your work will make a significant impact on the lives of so many people. This is something that I have learnt to never take for granted!”

“Cure Cancer grants provide the essential funding early-career researchers need to kick-start their careers. Cure Cancer also provides a supportive community that a lot of other funding bodies do not, allowing us to maintain connections and collaborate with other alumni in a meaningful way.”

Together, we can cure cancer.

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