Multi-scale Cancer Digital Twin

Who we are — Korea University Anam Hospital (Division of Oncology) & KIST

Two complementary Korean entities seeking to join a forming EU consortium under HORIZON-MISS-2026-02-CANCER-01. South Korea is a Horizon Europe Pillar II Associated Country — both entities are eligible for direct EU funding and named work-package roles on equal terms with EU partners.

Korea University Anam Hospital — Division of Oncology (PI: Prof. Kyong Hwa Park, MD, PhD)

• Operational EMR-linked cancer-patient digital twin platform: a clinical system already in active use, generating per-patient digital twins from real-time EMR data as time-series, with visual mapping of primary and metastatic tumors on digital organ phantoms.

• Early-stage TNBC clinical cohort with serial biopsy: ~20 patients; continuous tissue acquisition at diagnosis and treatment-response time points; clinical data integrated as time-series into the digital twin.

• Tumor immunology & cancer vaccine expertise: HSP90 epitope-based vaccine (Phase 1 completed), first-in-human AST-021p trial, immune checkpoint inhibitor indication discovery (KM-06); 3 patents (2019–2023).

• Multicenter trial & data-infrastructure leadership: K-MASTER coordinating center (2017–2021), AACR-GENIE PI (2023–present), Korean ARPA-H NeoVax-K co-PI (2026–2030); 55 SCI(E) publications in 5 years; 2024 AACR–KCR Joint Conference Co-chair.

KIST — Korea Institute of Science and Technology

• Imaging-based digital organ phantom & simulation (Dr. Moon Hyuk-Jun team): patient-specific digital organ phantoms from MRI/CT; physical simulation of primary/metastatic tumor locations; pipeline designed to interface directly with the KU Anam clinical twin.

• Multi-omics molecular-level twin (Dr. Seo Seung-Bum team): multi-omics characterization of the tumor microenvironment (TME); integration of genomic, transcriptomic and proteomic data into a molecular-level patient twin for treatment-response prediction.

• End-to-end VHT integration capability: the two KIST teams are designed to be organically coupled with the KU Anam clinical platform, enabling a unified molecular–imaging–clinical multi-scale patient twin.

What we can contribute as partners

Together we cover three of the four technical pillars required by the call: clinical validation and patient cohorts (KU Anam), AI/imaging integration and physical simulation (KIST imaging team), and multi-omics/molecular integration (KIST molecular team). Our unique differentiator: an operational, EMR-linked cancer-patient digital twin platform already generating real-world clinical data — something no standard academic partner brings.

The consortium we hope to join

We are looking for a forming consortium that brings complementary strengths — in particular mechanistic/multiscale modelling, the fourth technical pillar of the call — and that would benefit from adding a clinically operational digital twin platform, a serial-biopsy TNBC cohort, and imaging/multi-omics integration capabilities to its team. We would be happy to contribute as funded consortium partners and to take on clearly defined work-package roles, including co-leadership where relevant.

Contact

Dr. Juyong Yoon | KIST Europe | juyong.yoon@kist-europe.de