We are pleased to invite you to a lecture by Sara Lacerda, PhD, a researcher at CBM (Centre de Biophysique Moléculaire), CNRS (Centre national de la recherche scientifique), Orléans, France.
The lecture will take place on Monday, 23 March 2026 at 12:00, in the Council Hall of the Faculty of Food Technology and Biotechnology, Pierottijeva 6, Zagreb.
In her talk, Sara Lacerda will discuss the development of novel peptide-based contrast agents for early non-invasive diagnosis and molecular imaging of cardiovascular diseases and metastatic cancer. She will highlight imaging probes targeting biomarkers such as tropoelastin, type III collagen, and netrin-1, aimed at improving disease understanding and enabling more precise patient stratification.
The lecture is organized by the Faculty of Food Technology and Biotechnology, University of Zagreb, with HDBMB as a co-organizer.
The lecturer’s biography and abstract are provided below:
Sara Lacerda
Received her PhD from the University of Lisboa (2009) during which she developed and studied theranostic agents. After, she did a short postdoc at the University of Lübeck (Germany) on Fragment-Based Drug Discovery. In 2010-2012, she focused on bimodal Optical/MRI lanthanide-based nanoparticle contrast agents, at Centre de Biophysique Moléculaire (CBM, Orléans, France). From 2013 to 2015, she worked as a Research Associate at King’s College London (UK). There, she developed on PET/MRI contrast agents targeted for cardiovascular diseases. In 2016 she re-joined CBM as CNRS Researcher. Her current project focuses on multimodal peptide-based contrast agents. She has published >45 papers in international peer-reviewed journals (h-index 20), 1 patent and 7 book chapters. She is also Co-Scientific Manager of the In vivo Imaging Centre, CNRS Orléans
Towards better detection of cardiovascular disease and metastatic cancer
Sara Lacerda
Centre de Biophysique Moléculaire, CNRS, rue Charles Sadron, 45071 Orléans, France
Despite advanced screening technology and treatments available today, and the successful implementation of several primary and secondary prevention strategies, cancer and cardiovascular diseases (including atherosclerosis) remain the most common cause of premature death and lifelong disability. Such conditions benefit highly from early non-invasive diagnosis, enabling more appropriate and effective treatment choices.
Molecular imaging of specific biomarkers provides improved understanding of the disease, early diagnosis and insights of disease progression. Follow-up of treatment, drug delivery and potential patient stratification are also of main importance.
Amongst the highly explored “smart” targeted contrast agents, tailored peptide-based contrast agents have gain increased attention. Design strategy of such contrast agents include radioiodination of one amino acid residue, incorporation of reactive groups for further radiofluorination or optical detection, introduction of a Gd3+ binding site into a scaffold protein, or the conjugation of peptides to bifunctional chelating agents to enable coordination of metals/radiometals of interest (Lacerda, Inorganics 2018).
Novel peptide-based contrast agents specific for Tropoelastin (Circ Cardiov Imaging 2018, Cardiov Res 2019), Type III Collagen (npj Imaging 2024) and Netrin-1 (Bioconjugate Chem 2024) will be presented.
Acknowledgements: SL thanks Ligue Contre le Cancer, Cancéropôle Grand Ouest and British Heart Foundation for funding.
