Targeting Pancreas Cancer is a research collaboration, supported by a generous grant from The Thompson Family Foundation. The overall objective of the collaboration is to improve survival for pancreas cancer patients.
Pancreas cancer has the worst prognosis of any cancer, with only 8% of patients still alive five or more years after diagnosis. Moreover, the incidence of this disease is rising steadily. While advances in genetics have enhanced our understanding of the biology of this cancer and identified genetic factors that raise pancreatic cancer risk, a number of obstacles remain:
Investigators from three of the world's leading medical research institutions - Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK), Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL), and the Weizmann Institute of Science (WIS), with collaborators from Weill Cornell Medical Center and Sheba Medical Center - are pooling their expertise, their vision, and their scientific and patient resources to take on this challenge. Our goal is improving survival for pancreas cancer patients. Our strategy to achieve this goal is to conduct pivotal research aimed at (1). Early detection of pancreas cancer before symptoms developed. We will study novel new blood based biomarkers and new imaging methodologies; (2) Locally Advanced Pancreas Cancers that cannot be surgically removed; using a new treatment modality, immune modulated vascular targeted photodynamic therapy, as a bridge to surgery or as definitive treatment; (3) Late-Stage pancreas cancer: develop novel therapies for metastatic pancreas cancer. Current Initiatives include (a) obtain a better understanding of how the immune system is suppressed in pancreatic cancer, and identify new therapies that target immune suppression; (b) use gene editing with CRISPR, to identify target enzymes in the Nrf2 pathway; (c) study the role of activated stress responses in pancreatic cancer to develop new targets in this pathway; (d) examine the way altered p53 influences pancreatic cancer growth and develop treatments that target mutated p53. More than twenty-five senior investigators from basic and translational-clinical science groups at the collaborating institutions are pooling their efforts to achieve our goal.