Remote SWEATSkin PATCH for Monitoring Breast Cancer Therapeutic Response

Introduction

Breast Cancer (BC) is the most common cancer in Europe. In most cases, BC will present at a locally advanced or distant stage, which requires anticancer drugs. However, there is no guarantee that the favorable drug benefit/risk balance will align with expectations at an individual level or be maintained over time.

Importance of Monitoring

Therefore, monitoring tumor response to treatment is critical for timely adjusting the therapeutic strategy to improve patients’ outcomes. To fulfill this unmet medical need, SWEATPATCH proposes an innovative non-invasive approach to monitor in real-time BC response to treatment, based on emerging odorous biomarkers, namely volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from sweat emanated from the breast skin.

Biomarkers and Technology

Due to their connection to breast tumor metabolism, sweat VOCs are promising candidate biomarkers for monitoring tumor response to treatment. SWEATPATCH's breakthrough relies on a radically new technology with cutting-edge straintronic microwave based on phononic metamaterials and nanomaterials chemtronics technologies to solve scientific bottlenecks for sweat VOCs analysis in the near field of cancer cells.

Consortium and Development

SWEATPATCH will gather an interdisciplinary consortium of leading experts in materials, sensors, data processing, and translational/clinical oncology from 6 countries. The consortium will develop a groundbreaking wireless Lab-on-a-Patch to:

1. Monitor BC therapeutic response directly from the breast surface using a novel biocompatible flexible patch combined with specific data analysis.
2. Be adaptable to in vitro 3D culture systems of patients’ derived organoids, a tumor model avatar created from patients’ BC, which will be used for drug screening to model tumor response to treatment.

Future Implications

SWEATPATCH will convey a considerable conceptual leap that will shift the current healthcare paradigm from "one-size-fits-all" monitoring to "a smart real-time personalized monitoring" synchronized to tumor biology to reach precision oncology.