CIC resident member Melanie Rutkowski, PhD, was awarded the 2025 Victoria’s Secret Global Fund for Women’s Cancers Rising Innovator Grant. The award, in partnership with Pelotonia and the American Association for Cancer Research, funds innovative research projects in breast and gynecologic cancers undertaken by female scientists. The program invests in mid-career female scientists performing groundbreaking research in women’s cancers to improve outcomes for women diagnosed with these devastating diseases. Rutkowski will receive $700,000 for her project “Investigating how TLR5 signaling on Myeloid Cells Promotes Immune Therapy Failure for Ovarian Cancer.”
Per the National Cancer Institute, ovarian cancer is the eighth most common cancer in women globally and the fifth leading cause of cancer death for women in the US. This is in part due to the cancer being difficult to detect before it has spread to other organs – nearly 80% of patients are diagnosed after the cancer has metastasized, which makes the disease much more difficult to treat. Patients will often respond well to early treatments, but their cancers very commonly recur and develop resistance to chemotherapy. Immune therapies, which harness and amplify the body’s natural defenses against cancer and disease, have transformed patient care in other cancers, but remain ineffective against ovarian cancer. The Rutkowski Lab will use this award to study how molecular signaling between bacterial flagellin and the tumor cell can smother the patient’s immune response, making immune therapies ineffective.
Rutkowski is an expert in understanding how the bacteria that live in our bodies affect cancer progression. As tumors grow, they create a microenvironment within the body. For example, some tumors actively create an acidic microenvironment, which breaks down the surrounding tissues, making it easier for the cancer to spread. These microenvironmental changes can alter the balance of bacterial species around the tumor, allowing bacteria from the mouth and gut to inhabit tissues they ordinarily could not survive in. Recently, the lab discovered that bacterial flagellin in ovarian tumors can inhibit immune therapies through TLR5 signaling, a pathway that normally activates the immune system in response to bacterial infections. Rutkowski and coworkers will use this grant award to understand this TLR5 paradox and to devise strategies that disrupt the cancer-bacterial alliance. Rutkowski and her team anticipate that this work will improve the efficacy of immune therapies for ovarian tumors, which have been largely ineffective, resulting in enhanced outcomes for women diagnosed with this disease.