# Integrating highly multiplexed immunofluorescence with label-free 2D hyperspectral chemical imaging to interrogate the colorectal cancer tumor-invasive front

> **NIH NIH F32** · STANFORD UNIVERSITY · 2024 · $74,284

## Abstract

Project Summary/Abstract
Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the second most common cause of cancer-related death in the United States. Despite
advances in both diagnostic and therapy, a large inter-individual variability in therapy response and diagnostic
accuracy can be observed. The optimization of medical imaging agents in CRC is a critical component for
improving our technical capabilities relating to early diagnostics, complete labeling of tumor-positive tissue for
surgical resection, surveillance, and precision therapy. One major requirement for improving the clinical
performance of therapeutics and medical imaging agents is the characterization of structural and functional
chemistries in cancerous tissue that are either different from or absent in normal tissue. This is especially
important in regions that may not be sufficiently labeled by existing imaging agents with a clinically acceptable
and implementable signal-to-background ratio. In these cases, curative surgical intervention achieves mixed
success in the CRC patient population due to the technical inability to label accurately and precisely tumor-
positive tissues. Moreover, these differences may potentially explain the clinically observed variation in patient
therapy response and disease aggressiveness.
To develop a computational workflow that integrates CODEX imaging with high-dimensional hyperspectral
chemical mapping and test my hypothesis, my experimental structure is divided into two main components. (1)
I will perform preliminary non-destructive, label-free spatiochemical imaging on normal and CRC patient biopsies
to identify differences in the functional heterogenous chemistries. (2) I will perform spatial omic identification of
CRC related tissue architectures using CODEX for integration with the high-dimensional label-free 2D infrared
spectral maps.
The innovation of this research is the development of the computational workflow and framework that integrates
highly multiplexed CODEX with high-dimensional label-free 2D hyperspectral chemical imaging. This approach
can lead an alternative representation of physicochemical tissue properties for the characterization and
identification of spatiochemistries relevant to CRC and its tumor-invasive front. Long-term, this can be used in
the future to guide the development and optimization of cancer imaging agents to improve patient overall
outcomes.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10997114
- **Project number:** 1F32CA294924-01
- **Recipient organization:** STANFORD UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Elizabeth A Holman
- **Activity code:** F32 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $74,284
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2024-07-15 → 2027-07-14

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10997114

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10997114, Integrating highly multiplexed immunofluorescence with label-free 2D hyperspectral chemical imaging to interrogate the colorectal cancer tumor-invasive front (1F32CA294924-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-30 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10997114. Licensed CC0.

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