Innovative metabolic mapping to predict and enhance the response of targeted anti-cancer therapies

Breast cancer tumours alter their metabolism to resist drugs, and this project will track those metabolic changes in real time to predict which therapies will fail. The problem is that two patients with the same cancer type can respond completely differently to the same drug. The difference often lies not in the tumour’s genetics but in how it processes nutrients—its metabolism. Current tests largely ignore this. The project will use advanced imaging and tracing tools to map how breast cancer cells consume glucose, fats, and other nutrients, and how the surrounding tissue environment influences that consumption. If successful, this work could reveal metabolic “weak spots” that make tumours vulnerable to specific drugs. In the longer term, it might lead to treatment strategies that combine targeted therapies with dietary changes—for example, restricting certain nutrients to starve resistant cells. This would give oncologists a new, non-genetic lever to slow tumour growth and overcome drug resistance, without requiring new drugs. The research is fundamental in nature, but it directly addresses a practical clinical gap: why some tumours stop responding to treatment.