Annual-Report-2019

Dr Sébastien Roger
CONSORTIUM COORDINATOR
SMART LOIRE VALLEY Programme
Dr S. Roger is Associate Professor in Physiology at the University of Tours and a nominated member of the University
Institute of France (IUF).
His research is performed in the “Transplantation, Immunology, Inflammation” lab, where he studies the involvement of
ion channels and transporters in the invasive properties of carcinoma cells and the metastatic progression of tumours.
His research is aimed at exploring new therapeutic opportunities for the prevention of cancer progression. He was
awarded the Prize « Ruban Rose Avenir » in 2017. S. Roger serves as an associate editor in Scientific Reports (Nature
Publishing Group), Cancer cell International (BMC, Springer Nature), Frontiers in Pharmacology and Frontiers in
Cellular Biochemistry.
He is co-responsible for the “Physiopathologies” axis at the Doctoral School “Health, Biological Science and Chemistry”
(ED549, Tours-Orléans), and responsible for the Master “Biology and Health” at the University of Tours.
PHARMACOLOGICAL AND NUTRITIONAL TARGETING VOLTAGE-GATED SODIUM
CHANNELS IN THE TREATMENT OF EPITHELIAL CANCERS
The primary objective of this consortium is to create a solid scientific network between internationally recognized
researchers and clinicians, with different and complementary expertise and approaches, in order to develop collaborative
strategies for:
1) Understanding the molecular and cellular mechanisms by which NaV channels promote cancer progression by
controlling cell invasiveness and metastases development.
2) Identifying NaV channels and associated signaling pathways as cancer markers and prognostic factors.
3) Assessing the possibility that NaV channels could serve as new pharmacological targets for anticancer treatments and
for reducing cancer-associated pain.
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This consortium represents the unique opportunity to gather, in the Centre-Val de Loire region, specialists of NaV channels,
in different biological systems, with researchers in cancer cell biology and electrophysiology, medicinal chemists,
anesthesiologists, clinicians, surgeons, in order to develop new strategies to target epithelial cancers and associated
pain. Ambitions of this consortium are first to generate a solid scientific and clinical international network specifically
addressing the “involvement of Ion channels in the cancer disease”.
It is expected that this collaborative work will provide critical preliminary results for original research articles, reviews,
patents and will support applications to European/international grants, benefit to the training of master’s and PhD students
and result in the generation high quality researchers with an international scientific network and lead to the organisation
of international scientific meetings on Sodium Channel in Physiopathology. So far, partners of this consortium met three
weeks in Tours: 19-23 February 2018, 02-06 July 2018 , 18-22 February 2019 and 04-08 November 2019.
To date, scientific presentations have been performed, partners applied to a Medical Research Council (UK) call for Cancer
Research and Global Health Initiative, invited new potential international partners (from Spain) and specialists of animal
models of cancer and dedicated imaging, initiated collaborative work that already led to the publication of one original
research article (Dutta S. et al., Bioorg Med Chem. 2018 May 15;26(9):2428-2436).