Project title: Immune and microbiome determinants of gastric atrophy progression and attenuation: insights from mouse models and patient tissue spatial transcriptomics

Project No.: 1.1.1.3/1./24/A/034

Period: 1st May 2025 – 30 April 2028

Project costs: 656 455 EUR

Principal Investigator: Dr. biol. Vita Rovīte

This project aims to investigate microbial and immune determinants of gastric atrophy and intestinal metaplasia formation in patients’ tissue samples and mouse models of induced parietal cell atrophy and human gastric microbiome transplant to develop strategies for the prevention of GC transformation.

The results of the study will bring significant findings to the GC research field as during the project we will assess the GC development on several levels: (1) we will be able to modulate and evaluate how interaction with T cell pathways could shift inner immunologic microenvironment of gastric tissue and identify triggers of atrophy delay, (2) in human microbiome transplant model we will be able to populate germ-free mice stomachs with microbiome communities of specific known profiles to follow how specific genus could affect gastric tissue to identify new harmful microbial profiles for further exploration of potential atrophy interventions, (3) by using spatial transcriptomics on patients’ gastric tissue with known gastric microbiome profiles and linking obtained data with results in mouse experiments we will be able to specifically dissect alterations of the transcriptome to specific gastric tissue cell populations that could be used for the development of therapies against gastric atrophy and GC.

Information published 06.05.2025.