Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) is the most common form of leukemia in Europe and it remains incurable. Targeted therapies have made a breakthrough in the treatment of CLL over the last decade. However, many patients develop resistance, have severe side effects or relapse during treatment. To prevent ineffective treatment and toxic effects, there is an unmet clinical need for tailoring optimal therapy for each patient.

Our research group focuses on developing functional precision medicine for B-cell malignancies, in particular CLL. By performing functional analyses such as drug sensitivity screening and single cell signaling analyses directly on the patients' cancer cells, our aim is to identify biomarker signatures that can predict treatment outcomes for the individual patient, and thus guide treatment decisions.

Select publications

1. Yin Y, Xu H, He L, Brown JR, Mato AR, Aittokallio T, Skånland SS. Protein Profiles Predict Treatment Responses to the PI3K Inhibitor Umbralisib in Patients with Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia. Clin Cancer Res. 2025 May 15;31(10):1943-1955. doi: 10.1158/1078-0432.CCR-24-2911. PMID: 40085050; PMCID: PMC12081185.
2. Arseni L, Sigismondo G, Yazdanparast H, Hermansen JU, Mack N, Ohl S, Kalter V, Iskar M, Kalxdorf M, Friedel D, Rettel M, Paul Y, Ringshausen I, Eldering E, Dubois J, Kater AP, Zapatka M, Roessner PM, Tausch E, Stilgenbauer S, Dietrich S, Savitski MM, Skånland SS, Krijgsveld J, Lichter P, Seiffert M. Longitudinal omics data and preclinical treatment suggest the proteasome inhibitor carfilzomib as therapy for ibrutinib-resistant CLL. Nat Commun. 2025 Jan 26;16(1):1041. doi: 10.1038/s41467-025-56318-7. PMID: 39863584; PMCID: PMC11762753.
3.Hermansen JU, Yin Y, Rein ID, Skånland SS. Immunophenotyping with (phospho)protein profiling and fluorescent cell barcoding for single-cell signaling analysis and biomarker discovery. NPJ Precis Oncol. 2024 May 20;8(1):107. doi: 10.1038/s41698-024-00604-y. PMID: 38769096; PMCID: PMC11106235.
4. Montoya S, Bourcier J, Noviski M, Lu H, Thompson MC, Chirino A, Jahn J, Sondhi AK, Gajewski S, Tan YSM, Yung S, Urban A, Wang E, Han C, Mi X, Kim WJ, Sievers Q, Auger P, Bousquet H, Brathaban N, Bravo B, Gessner M, Guiducci C, Iuliano JN, Kane T, Mukerji R, Reddy PJ, Powers J, Sanchez Garcia de Los Rios M, Ye J, Barrientos Risso C, Tsai D, Pardo G, Notti RQ, Pardo A, Affer M, Nawaratne V, Totiger TM, Pena-Velasquez C, Rhodes JM, Zelenetz AD, Alencar A, Roeker LE, Mehta S, Garippa R, Linley A, Soni RK, Skånland SS, Brown RJ, Mato AR, Hansen GM, Abdel-Wahab O, Taylor J. Kinase-impaired BTK mutations are susceptible to clinical-stage BTK and IKZF1/3 degrader NX-2127. Science. 2024 Feb 2;383(6682):eadi5798. doi: 10.1126/science.adi5798. Epub 2024 Feb 2. PMID: 38301010; PMCID: PMC11103405.
5. 
5. Hermansen JU, Yin Y, Urban A, Myklebust CV, Karlsen L, Melvold K, Tveita AA, Taskén K, Munthe LA, Tjønnfjord GE, Skånland SS. A tumor microenvironment model of chronic lymphocytic leukemia enables drug sensitivity testing to guide precision medicine. Cell Death Discov. 2023 Apr 13;9(1):125.

Contact information

  sigrid.skanland@ous-research.no

Department of Cancer Immunology, Institute for Cancer Research
Oslo University Hospital, Ullernchausseen 70, 0379 Oslo, Norway