Lugano – Antonio Marra, a medical oncologist at the Division of New Drugs for Innovative Therapies at the European Institute of Oncology (IEO), has been selected as a recipient of the Next Gen Clinician Scientist Grant, awarded by the AIRC Foundation for Cancer Research.

This highly competitive grant supports young physician-scientists in conducting independent clinical research to improve cancer treatment practices.

Born in 1990 in the province of Salerno, Marra earned his medical degree in Italy before completing a specialization in medical oncology in Milan. He later moved to New York for a three-year postdoctoral fellowship at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC). Thanks to the support of the José Baselga Fellowship from the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO), he returned to Italy to continue his work at IEO.

Marra’s five-year research project, which has secured over €320,000 in funding for its first year, focuses on HR+/HER2- breast cancer—the most common form of the disease, accounting for roughly 70% of all cases.

The goal is to develop tools that help deliver personalized, targeted treatments based on each patient’s unique profile, thereby increasing the chances of successful therapy and survival.

At the heart of the project is a focus on homologous recombination deficiency (HRD), a DNA repair defect that can trigger tumor development but also renders cancer cells more sensitive to certain therapies—especially PARP inhibitors.