Dr. María Florencia Mercogliano is an Assistant Researcher at the Instituto de Biología y Medicina Experimental (IBYME), affiliated with the National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET) in Buenos Aires, Argentina. She holds a PhD in Chemical Sciences and a bachelor’s degree in Biological Sciences from the University of Buenos Aires, reflecting a strong foundation in both chemistry and molecular biology. Her academic training has provided her with interdisciplinary expertise spanning biochemical processes and cellular immunology, which she applies to her research in cancer biology.
Her research focuses on understanding the mechanisms underlying therapy resistance in breast cancer, particularly in HER2-positive and triple-negative subtypes. Dr. Mercogliano has been at the forefront of work exploring how soluble tumor necrosis factor (sTNF) upregulates mucin 4 (MUC4) — a membrane glycoprotein that can shield cancer cells from targeted therapies such as trastuzumab — thereby contributing to treatment failure and poor outcomes. Her work has helped identify the sTNF/MUC4 axis as a potential therapeutic target and biomarker to guide combination treatments and improve response rates in aggressive breast cancers.
In addition to her focused program on cytokine-mediated resistance mechanisms, Dr. Mercogliano’s broader interests include the immunological aspects of tumor progression and strategies to enhance therapeutic efficacy through modulation of the tumor microenvironment. She has co-authored multiple peer-reviewed articles on these topics in international scientific journals, contributing to the global understanding of immune-related resistance pathways in breast cancer and emerging targeted therapies.
Laboratorio de Inmunología Tumoral
Instituto de Biología y Medicina Experimental
Vuelta de Obligado 2490
(1428) Buenos Aires, Argentina
https://ibyme.org.ar/investigacion/laboratorios/inmunologia-tumoral/