Cancer Research Day - Syöpätutkimuspäivä 2025

12.3.2025, Arvo F114

Programme (pdf)


8:30 – 8:35:  Opening words:
  Prof. Teemu Murtola

Session 1  Chair: Prof. Teemu Murtola

8.35 – 9.20    KEYNOTE TALK: Dr. Vidhya Ravi
Tumor’s Ecosystem: Friend or Foe?
Department of Neurosurgery, Medical Centre, University of Freiburg,
Germany

9.20 – 9.32         Presentation selected based on submitted abstracts (10 + 2 min)

Erdogan Pekcan Erkan: Sustained epithelial interferon signaling modulates incomplete pathological response in colorectal cancer

9:32 – 9.45  Pitch talks (a 2 min)

  1. Luca Manninoa: Epitope Generation Gateway (EGG): A Context-Aware Pipeline for Neoantigen Prioritization and Cancer Immunotherapy
  2. Sasa Rauhalinna: Modular Plug and Play Recombinant 3D hydrogel system for studying cancer invasion
  3. Zhesi Zhang: MiREA: a network-based tool for global and cancer-specific miRNA- oriented enrichment analysis
  4. Peppi Kauppinen: Utilizing Cyclic Immunofluorescence to Detect Spatial Differentiation in Prostate Cancer -Atorvastatin versus placebo treated patients
  5. Göktuğ Karabiyik: Exploring the differential invasion patterns of glioblastoma and gliosarcoma cells on 3D hydrogel matrix.
  6. Laura Huhtala: DNA methylation based regulation and neuro-developmental trajectories of central nervous system tumors

9.45 –10.30  Poster session and Coffee, tea and snacks  (45 min)

10.30 – 10.50   Prof. Anssi Auvinen: ProScreen randomised prostate
screening trial
SOC, Tampere University

10.50 – 11.15 Presentations selected based on submitted abstracts (a 10 + 2 min)

1)  Aliisa M. Tiihonen: Hypoxia shapes Tumor Immune
microenvironment Through Cell-Type Dependent Responses in Diffuse
Astrocytomas

2)  Konsta Kukkonen: Androgen receptor activation leads to divergent
chromatin  regulation in nonmalignant and malignant prostate
epithelial cells

11.15 – 12.05 Lunch break  (50  min)  + Posters

Session 2    Chair: Director, Chief Physician Annika Auranen

12.05 – 12.50: KEYNOTE TALK:  Prof. Ferdinando Chiaradonna:
                             Rethinking the Warburg effect in the light of Hexosamine Biosynthesis
Pathway
                     University of Milano-Bicocca, Dept of Biotechnology and Biosciences,
Tumor Biochemistry lab

12.50 – 13.10: Ass. Prof. Heidi Haikala: Studying lung cancer drug resistance using
fully human models
MET, Tampere University and University of Helsinki

13.10 – 13.50: Presentations selected based on submitted abstracts
(a 10 + 2 min)

  • Argyro Bizaki-Vallaskangas: Novel genetic risk variants associated with oral tongue squamous cell carcinoma
  • Lotta Isosaari: Exploring multicellular dynamics in glioblastoma: a 3D open-top chip model with integrated neurovascular networks for drug testing
  • Ismaïl Hermelo: Unsupervised clustering reveals noncanonical myeloid cell subsets in the brain tumor microenvironment

13.50  – 14.10  Coffee break   (20 min.)

Session 3     Chair:  Prof. Toni Seppälä

14.10 – 14.55:  KEYNOTE TALK: Prof. Lauri Aaltonen:
Uterine leiomyoma as a model for neoplasia
Faculty of Medicine, Department of Medical and Clinical Genetics,
University of Helsinki

14.55  – 15.15  Adj.Prof.  Kirsi Rautajoki: Regulatory landscape of diffuse
astrocytomas
MET, Tampere University

15.15 – 15.55    Presentations selected based on submitted abstracts ( a 10+2 min)

1)  Liang Zhang: A biologically informed AI framework for precise
stratification of cancer patients using their genomic features

2) Anja Hartewig: Integrative multi-modal analysis reveals the contribution
of noncoding RNAs to post-treatment progression of IDH-mutant
astrocytomas

3) Rafeul Hasan: Elucidating the Genetic Basis of Side Effects in users of
Androgen Signaling Inhibitors – A Focused Analysis of 5-alpha reductase

15.55 – 16.00          Closing words:  Director Annika Auranen

Organisers: Tays Cancer Centre in collaboration with the Faculty of Medicine and Health Technology, Tampere University and Tampere University Hospital, Pirha