̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - Bruce Ponder

Cambridge Cancer Centre: the vision

bjb42 — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 14:26:50 +0000

Cancer will affect one in three of us during our lifetime and is a leading cause of death and disability worldwide. Today though, there is a new sense of optimism, as scientific advances have led us to the point where an understanding of the molecular and cellular biology of cancer is being translated into real benefits for patients.

Over the past 10 years, cancer research efforts within the ̽��ֱ��, the Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (Addenbrooke’s) and the many institutes and centres in Cambridge and nearby have been drawing science and medicine closer together. Helping to connect this research community, a virtual Cambridge Cancer Centre was launched in 2006 to promote interactions among researchers and clinicians working in diverse areas, as well as with biotech and pharmaceutical companies. ̽��ֱ��virtual organisation promotes information exchange between members, hosts cross-disciplinary scientific meetings and makes available pump-priming grants for new collaborative research with potential clinical application.

Creating the research environment

Clinical research must be nourished and renewed from fundamental research. Across the ̽��ֱ��, cancer research is strongly represented in many departments – from the biomedical sciences to the physical sciences, and increasingly embracing mathematics, engineering and computational biology. Research projects are investigating all aspects of cancer, whether it’s at the level of DNA, cells or populations. Research goals include identifying new therapeutics, imaging tumours, and devising computational approaches that analyse vast amounts of data.

Three major laboratories in Cambridge have been created with a focus on cancer research: the Cancer Research UK Cambridge Research Institute (CRI)/Li Ka Shing Centre, the Hutchison/Medical Research Council Research Centre, and part of the Strangeways Research Laboratory. Together, they provide space for almost 500 researchers, plus state-of-the-art supporting facilities for technologies such as genome sequencing, molecular imaging, microscopy and computational biology. But more than this, the new laboratories are bridging the interface between science and the clinic.

Translating research into patient care

Successfully applying the results of research requires an excellent clinical service and clinical research environment. Cambridge is very much a cancer centre when it comes to strengths in clinical and healthcare innovation. Cancer was one of three main themes when Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Health Partners, which includes the Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and the ̽��ֱ��, was selected last year by the Department of Health as one of five Academic Health Science Centres in the UK. It was also the leading theme when an international panel selected Cambridge as one of five Biomedical Research Centres funded by the NHS in 2006.

Intensive studies in experimental medicine are being built up in collaboration with major pharmaceutical companies and academic researchers. Multidisciplinary clinical teams for each cancer type have been created that include ̽��ֱ�� and NHS staff working closely together, enabling research and clinical care to proceed side by side.

Catalysing great ideas

New ideas are likely to lie at the boundaries between disciplines or between laboratory and clinic, and even at the margins of conventional career paths and funding. At the CRI, for example, many researchers are also clinicians, and oncologists work alongside mathematicians, biochemists and cell biologists. Across Cambridge, an important part of the long-term vision is to stimulate training programmes to equip researchers to cross traditional academic boundaries.

Playing to scientific strengths, much current research is focusing on achieving earlier diagnosis and treatment in high-risk groups, discovering the determinants of treatment resistance, and providing individually tailored treatment (personalised medicine) based on genomic information. By harnessing the catalytic effect of the Cancer Centre on Cambridge science, great opportunities lie ahead in the development of powerful new approaches to diagnosing and treating cancer.

For more information, please contact Professor Sir Bruce Ponder (bruce.ponder@cancer.org.uk), the Li Ka Shing Professor of Oncology, Director of the Cancer Research UK CRI/Li Ka Shing Centre and Director of the Cambridge Cancer Centre.

Professor Sir Bruce Ponder describes the vision of a Cambridge-wide initiative to link world-class cancer research to improved patient care.

Cambridge Cancer Centre

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CRI: linking the laboratory to the cancer clinic

ns480 — Fri, 01 May 2009 12:58:17 +0000

̽��ֱ��CRI is the most recent of five comprehensive research institutes core funded by Cancer Research UK. Housed in the magnificent, custom-built, £50 million Li Ka Shing Centre, the Institute is located on the Cambridge Biomedical Campus. With more than 250 scientists in 19 research groups, it is one of the largest cancer research facilities in Europe.

Officially opened in early 2007, the Institute is already internationally acclaimed for the high calibre of its research. ‘We’ve been able to hit the ground running,’ said Director Professor Sir Bruce Ponder, ‘and this is largely because the funding we receive from Cancer Research UK means that we can guarantee salary, staff, laboratory space and core facilities, so the individuals we recruit have minimal interruption to research as they set up their laboratories.’

Group leaders have been carefully chosen with complementary research interests in mind – roughly half are engaged in the study of fundamental aspects of cancer cell biology and half in technology-based or clinical-based research; over a third are clinically qualified. Many of the group leaders hold joint appointments with the Hospital, the ̽��ֱ�� (seven within the Department of Oncology) or research institutes on the Cambridge Biomedical Campus. CRI’s location on the Campus offers outstanding opportunities for such interaction because of its proximity to the Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (Addenbrooke’s), the ̽��ֱ�� School of Clinical Medicine and its associated institutes, and the Medical Research Council (MRC) Laboratory of Molecular Biology and four MRC Units.

All of these interactions are crucial to the success of the Institute, as Professor Ponder (who is also Head of the Department of Oncology) explained: ‘It’s no good creating a freestanding institute that’s got a ‘moat’ around it – we work hard to be fully connected with Cambridge’s research environment and the Hospital, both to expand our intellectual base and to ensure that laboratory advances are translated into benefits to cancer patients as quickly as possible. ̽��ֱ��joint appointments really make these interactions work, and is another reason we’ve been able to get off the ground so quickly.’

Recent research highlights include the discovery of precisely why some women develop resistance to the breast cancer drug tamoxifen. Dr Jason Carroll, who leads the Nuclear Receptor Transcription Laboratory, explained: ‘We knew that women developed resistance to tamoxifen but previously our understanding of why this occurred could be compared with trying to fix a broken car without knowing how the engine worked. Now we understand how all the engine parts operate and we can try to think about ways to make repairs.’

Professor Kevin Brindle, who leads the Molecular Imaging Laboratory, has developed a way of scanning the body using magnetic resonance imaging to a level of precision that could be used to detect cancer earlier, as well as for the evaluation and design of novel cancer therapies. Dr David Tuveson has set up a facility in the clinic for treating patients with pancreatic cancer and a matching experimental system in the laboratory to test and refine potential new treatments.

To strengthen cancer research collaborations across Cambridge, a virtual community has arisen with the CRI as its nucleus. ̽��ֱ��Cambridge Cancer Centre (CCC) forges links between cancer researchers in the biological and physical sciences, clinicians and local biotech companies.

‘CCC creates an environment in which basic research can have a practical application, collaborative projects can be developed, and new interdisciplinary work can be pump-primed,’ said Professor Ponder, who chairs the CCC Steering Committee. ‘We’re now moving into a new phase with the CCC in which we’re identifying collaborative research themes and developing the organisational structures that will help to drive them forward.’

What happens next at the CRI? Research at the Institute will bed down and integrated programmes will continue to develop. ̽��ֱ��top floor of the Institute is being kept in reserve. ‘In a few years’ time,’ said Professor Ponder, ‘the science at the Institute will have matured to the point where we will be able to make intelligent choices about what we need to add. My colleagues and I believe that we have something really special at the CRI, and I’m delighted to say that the funders and local community share our enthusiasm.’

For more information, please visit www.cambridgecancercentre.org.uk

̽��ֱ��Cambridge Research Institute (CRI) is driving the development of new approaches for the early detection, prevention and treatment of cancer.

We work hard to be fully connected with Cambridge’s research environment and the Hospital, both to expand our intellectual base and to ensure that laboratory advances are translated into benefits to cancer patients as quickly as possible.

Professor Sir Bruce Ponder

CRI

Cambridge Research Institute

Cancer Research UK

Formed in 2002 by the amalgamation of the two largest UK cancer charities – the Cancer Research Campaign and the Imperial Cancer Research Fund – Cancer Research UK continues a century-long history of funding cancer research. Its annual research budget funds the work of over 4500 scientists, doctors and nurses across the UK, including research at a number of specialised institutes and centres. ̽��ֱ��most recent of the core-funded institutes, the Cambridge Research Institute (CRI), is a flagship research enterprise located on the Cambridge Biomedical Campus.

In 2007–8, Cancer Research UK spent just over £31.5 million on laboratory research and clinical trials in Cambridge; around £17.5 million of this annual research spend provided core funding for the CRI.

Funding by Cancer Research UK covers all aspects of cancer research, from understanding fundamental cancer cell biology to large epidemiology studies across entire populations of people, as well as training the next generation of research scientists. Some examples in Cambridge include:

Several programme grants and a significant element of core funding to the Wellcome Trust/Cancer Research UK Gurdon Institute, where research is helping to uncover what goes wrong when a cell becomes cancerous, by investigating the processes that ensure that cells function correctly during normal development.
Funding the two UK arms of the largest study of diet and health ever undertaken – the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) – a long-term study of more than half a million people in 10 European countries. ̽��ֱ�� ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge manages the Norfolk arm of EPIC, which has recruited more than 30,000 people.
Scientists at the Strangeways Research Laboratory and Department of Oncology, who are searching for genes that increase cancer risk and investigating how the effects of the genes combine with lifestyle factors to cause cancer.
Cancer Research UK PhD Training Programme in Medicinal Chemistry, a collaborative initiative that brings together research groups with expertise in synthesis chemistry, pharmacology, biochemistry and cancer biology to train synthesis chemists to PhD level (www-medchem.ch.cam.ac.uk).

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