(Vienna, April 30, 2025) Eric Freund from the MedUni Vienna, together with his colleague Lea-Katharina Miebach from the INP in Greifswald, has been awarded a prize by the Mehdorn Family Foundation. The prize money will be used to support a research project that is pursuing a new strategy for overcoming resistance to therapy in brain tumors. The approach investigated by the research duo is considered promising for increasing the effectiveness of established therapies.
The development of strategies against resistance to therapy in brain tumors, a central problem in neuro-oncology, is the subject of intensive research. Eric Freund (Department of Neurosurgery, MedUni Vienna) and Lea-Katharina Miebach (Leibniz Institute for Plasma Science and Technology, Greifswald) are pursuing a completely new approach: treating tumor cells with medical gas plasma to cause oxidative stress in the cells. "Subjecting tumor cells to oxidative stress to make them more susceptible to chemotherapy or radiation is a promising approach to increasing the effectiveness of established therapies," said Maximilian Mehdorn, founder of the foundation and former director of the Clinic for Neurosurgery at the University Medical Center Schleswig-Holstein, praising the research project.
About the person:
Eric Freund studied medicine and biomedical science at the University of Greifswald. He completed his clinical studies at the Charité Berlin and the University Hospital of Zurich. He continued his research work on so-called immunogenic cell death through the oxidation of medical gas plasmas as an resident physician at the Department of Neurosurgery at MedUni Vienna under the direction of Prof. Karl Rössler.