New Clinical Trial Targets KRAS Mutations in Pancreatic Cancer

The trial, supported by the Lustgarten Foundation and Break Through Cancer, is now recruiting 20 patients with resectable or borderline resectable KRAS-mutant pancreatic cancer. Investigators Kevin Soares and Eileen O'Reilly will oversee the administration of the Elicio Therapeutics drug ELI-002 7P alongside mFOLFIRINOX chemotherapy, with or without the PD-1 inhibitor tislelizumab. Beyond assessing safety, the research team will perform extensive molecular analysis on tissue and blood samples gathered before and after treatment to identify specific biomarkers of response and resistance.

This study stems from the Demystifying Pancreatic Cancer Therapies TeamLab, a collaborative initiative involving six major research institutions, including Dana-Farber and MD Anderson. It builds on 2025 findings published in Nature Medicine, which demonstrated that earlier iterations of KRAS-targeted immunotherapy triggered robust immune responses post-surgery. By moving this intervention into the neoadjuvant setting, researchers hope to better understand the biological mechanisms that allow pancreatic tumors to evade immune detection, ultimately informing future therapeutic strategies.