Triple-negative breast cancer affects millions of people worldwide. It presents with aggressive growth and is very difficult to treat, because of the lack of targets (like HER2, PR, ER) for molecular interventions. The goal of the Meta-Targeting project (ERC-CoG 864121: “Macro-nanomedicine to treat metastatic cancer”) was to explore smart, rational and realistic concepts and combination therapies for better management of metastatic triple-negative breast cancer. In this context, “smart” did not refer to highly complex and ingenious drug delivery systems, but rather to strategies that can be realistically developed and pragmatically implemented in day-to-day clinical practice. The Meta-Targeting project was constructed in such a way that advances in multiple scientific disciplines were aligned and integrated, incl. prodrug design, nanomedicine formulation and pharmaceutical engineering (WP1), physical and pharmacological tumor microenvironment priming (WP2), identification of imaging and histopathological biomarkers (WP3), understanding and overcoming microenvironment-related resistance processes (WP4), and development of novel tools and technologies for immunotherapy potentiation (WP5). Upon finalization of the project, the majority of objectives in the respective work packages have been successfully completed. Detailed results and achievements are summarized in the next section. Alone and particularly together, the outcomes of the different project parts contribute to a better understanding of and improved treatment options for metastatic cancer.
