Andrea Valles received a BSc in Biotechnology at Polytechnic University of Valencia in Spain in 2016. At that moment, she followed her motivation and gut feeling and came to The Netherlands to study a MSc in Oncology at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. She started her PhD project which is entitled “Phosphoproteomics for target discovery in Pancreatic Cancer” and a joined effort of the Oncoproteomics Laboratory and Dr. Elisa Giovanetti and Dr. Maarten Bijlsma as part of a KWF-funded project. 

Its aim is to identify predicitve phosphoprotein biomarkers and drug targets for (combination)treatment of pancreatic cancer. To this end, kinase inhibitors will be tested in patient-derived xenograft models, as well as combinations with non-toxic ascorbic acid that emerged as a promising anti-cancer treatment that can synergize with conventional treatments.