The Mark Foundation for Cancer Research awards $3 million over three years to an international consortium led by Georg Winter, Scientific Director of Life Sciences at AITHYRA, in collaboration with researchers from EPFL and Stanford University to expand the therapeutic landscape for treatment-resistant cancers.
On 7 October 2026, the Mark Foundation for Cancer Research announced the recipients of its prestigious 2026 Endeavor Awards, providing a total of $12 million across four global, multi-institutional teams. Selected from a highly competitive pool of hundreds of applicant consortia, the 2026 awardees represent 11 premier academic research institutions across five countries – with AITHYRA among them as the coordinating hub of the BOLTS consortium.
The BOLTS project (Blocking oncogenic transcription via ligand-triggered SUMOylation) connects world-leading experts in chemical biology, biophysics, and AI-enabled structural biology: Georg Winter (AITHYRA, Austria), Nicolas Thomä and AITHYRA Global Adjunct PI Bruno Correia (EPFL, Switzerland), and Nathanael Gray (Stanford University, USA). Together, the team is building an integrated platform to design a new class of drug-like molecules that function as molecular “padlocks”. Rather than destroying cancer-driving transcription factors, these molecules recruit the cell’s native SUMOylation machinery to freeze target proteins in an inactive, “off” state. By locking these master regulators down, the consortium aims to silence oncogenic programs in aggressive treatment-resistant prostate, pancreatic, gastric, and brain cancers. Over the next three years, the research team will develop and validate this platform, combining AI-guided molecular design, high-throughput screening, and structural biology to deliver a new class of therapies.
Statement by Georg Winter: “Targeting aberrant transcriptional circuits in cancer represents a historic challenge in the field of therapeutic innovation. By leveraging the multi-disciplinary expertise of our team, we can take a completely new approach and apply it to some of the most compelling targets in highly aggressive cancers.”
Through its Endeavor Awards, the Mark Foundation for Cancer Research supports bold, creative team science that crosses boundaries. Alongside BOLTS, three other consortia were selected for funding, focusing on “Hacking Liver Metastases”, “Overcoming Immunotherapy Resistance in Stomach Cancer”, and “Rewiring Cancer’s Protectors into Active Tumor-Killers”.
The Mark Foundation for Cancer Research, a charitable organization based in New York City, actively partners with scientists worldwide to accelerate research that will transform cancer prevention, diagnosis, and treatment. Since 2017, The Mark Foundation has awarded over $300 million in grants to investigators at more than 120 academic institutions across 18 countries, with research programs focusing on early career support, team science collaboration, new technology innovation, and therapeutics discovery. Additionally, The Mark Foundation maintains a growing portfolio of investments in early-stage cancer diagnostics and therapeutics companies, including several that have transitioned from grantee projects into commercial development.
To learn more about the Mark Foundation, please visit: www.themarkfoundation.org;
https://themarkfoundation.org/portfolio/blocking-oncogenic-transcription-via-ligand-triggered-sumoylation-bolts/
#MarkFoundation #CancerResearch #AITHYRA #EPFL #StanfordUniversity