The Sant Pau Research Institute (IR Sant Pau) has been selected to participate in three high-impact scientific and technological projects funded through the 2024 Public-Private Collaboration Projects call from the Spanish State Research Agency (AEI), under the Ministry of Science, Innovation, and Universities. These grants, aimed at fostering the transfer of knowledge from research to the productive sector, represent a total funding of over €650,000 for the institute to develop new digital health tools. Innovative strategies for women’s health, and targeted cancer therapies based on nanotechnology.
The simultaneous award of these three projects places IR Sant Pau in a strategic position within translational research in Spain. This reinforces its role as a key scientific partner in public-private consortia that seek to transform laboratory advances into clinically applicable solutions.
The project ASISTE – “Advancing Interactive and Technological Solutions for the User Experience,” coordinated by Digimevo in collaboration with Eurecat and IR Sant Pau, aims to make a qualitative leap in the relationship between patients and healthcare services. The consortium will develop an advanced virtual assistant based on artificial intelligence technologies, capable of providing personalized information, supporting decision-making, and integrating recommendations to improve therapeutic adherence and self-care.
Unlike conventional systems, ASISTE will explore multimodal and adaptive models that anticipate patients’ needs, reduce uncertainty, and optimize the flow of clinical information before, during, and after healthcare delivery. The project aligns with current trends in digital health, which emphasize patient empowerment and care efficiency.
The participation of IR Sant Pau, led by Dr. Elisa Llurba, will be essential to bring the technology into a real clinical environment. The institute will coordinate the pilot validation of the virtual assistant at Sant Pau Hospital, including methodological design, usability assessment, impact measurement in clinical practice, and evaluation of health outcomes. This work will draw on the experience and capabilities of the Clinical Research and Clinical Trials Unit (UICEC) Sant Pau and the Drug Research Center (CIM), essential infrastructures to ensure a safe and effective deployment in patients. The project has been granted €153,643.99 for IR Sant Pau.
The second funded project, Study and Development of a Strategy to Modulate the Vaginal Microbiota with the Compound OXO-001, led by the biotech company Oxolife, focuses on the compound OXO-001 and its ability to modulate the vaginal microbiota and correct dysbiosis. The conditions that can affect gynecological and reproductive health. The initiative, involving the University of Barcelona and IR Sant Pau, addresses an emerging and relevant clinical field in which the vaginal microbiota is increasingly recognized as a key determinant of fertility and reproductive success.
IR Sant Pau plays a central role in the project’s clinical phase, in which the safety and biological effects of OXO-001 will be studied in healthy female volunteers, analyzing how it modulates microbial balance and assessing its potential to open new therapeutic strategies in fertility and women’s health, with Dr. Rosa Antonijoan as principal investigator. A leading expert in clinical pharmacology and first-in-human trials, Dr. Antonijoan will head the planning, execution, and supervision of the clinical study, which will be conducted at the CIM Sant Pau facilities, a platform renowned for its expertise in early-phase studies, safety assessment, and rigorous data monitoring. The grant awarded to IR Sant Pau for this project amounts to €147,129.81.
The third project, Innovative Nanodrug Targeted to CXCR4+ Tumor Cells: Toward the First-in-Human Clinical Trials of a Revolutionary Therapy for Aggressive Cancers, coordinated by the company Nanoligent—a spin-off linked to the UAB and IR Sant Pau—represents an innovative approach in precision oncology. The Institute of Nanoscience and Materials of Aragon and the Margarita Salas Center for Biological Research, both part of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), will also participate in its development.
The goal is to advance the preclinical development of the nanodrug NNL1524, based on a disruptive protein-drug nanoconjugate technology capable of specifically targeting tumor cells that overexpress the CXCR4 receptor. This receptor is a pan-cancer biomarker associated with tumor aggressiveness, poor prognosis, metastasis, and therapeutic resistance.
NNL1524 combines a modular protein design, a high-affinity ligand, and a potent cytotoxic agent, resulting in small-sized, highly selective nanomedicines that maximize targeted drug delivery to enhance antitumor efficacy while minimizing toxicity in healthy tissues. The project includes producing the first non-GMP batch of the nanodrug, extended pharmacokinetic and metabolism studies, and consolidating the preclinical evidence required for a first-in-human clinical trial application.
IR Sant Pau’s role in this consortium is pivotal. Under the direction of Dr. Ramon Mangues, the institute will conduct an extensive series of animal model studies to evaluate the nanodrug’s efficacy compared with standard treatments, characterize CXCR4 expression levels predictive of therapeutic response, and assess whether combining it with immunotherapies—such as immune checkpoint inhibitors—enhances antitumor effects. These studies are essential to define the clinical positioning of NNL1524 and support the design of future human trials. The project has received over €2.5 million in total funding, of which €360,720.89 corresponds to IR Sant Pau.
IR Sant Pau’s participation in these three AEI-funded projects strengthens its role as a center of excellence in translational biomedical research, capable of integrating fundamental science, technological innovation, clinical validation, and collaboration with the business sector. The institution provides consortia with a cutting-edge scientific ecosystem that includes the UICEC Sant Pau, CIM, Biobank, omics platforms, advanced imaging services, cytometry, microscopy, proteomics, and an animal experimentation service that enables complex in vivo studies.
Overall, the CPP2024 grants provide IR Sant Pau with €661,494.64 in competitive funding, supporting the development of innovative solutions with a direct impact on three priority areas for public health: digitalization of healthcare, women’s health promotion, and advancement of targeted cancer therapies.
