Annual Report 2020
Preface
The National Cancer Center Research Institute (NCCRI) was established in 1962 as one of the main parts of the National Cancer Center (NCC), and has been driving cancer research in Japan ever since. The NCC was designated a National Research and Development Agency in April 2015. Since then, there has been greater demand than ever to promote research and development and to maximize clinical outputs. To meet this demand, the NCCRI has been collaborating closely with the NCC Hospital, Hospital East, the Exploratory Oncology Research & Clinical Trial Center, the Center for Public Health Sciences, the Center for Cancer Control and Information Services, and the Center for Cancer Genomics and Advanced Therapeutics, and has thereby sought to maximize the transition “from bench to bedside”.
At present, in addition to 19 divisions and six independent research units, the NCCRI also contains the Fundamental Innovative Oncology Center (FIOC), which is a core facility for the entire NCC. The FIOC consists of 13 departments, and it runs the NCC BioBank, prepares bioresources including patient-derived xenograft (PDX), provides specialized techniques, and also facilitates collaborative work with various private sector organizations outside the NCC. As of March 2021, the NCCRI has 93 research staff, 66 postdoctoral fellows and 160 graduate students/supporting staff, all of whom are dedicated to a wide range of cancer research, including prevention of cancer based on carcinogenic mechanism, elucidating the inter- or intra-tumor heterogeneity and in vivo network mechanism, identification of diagnostic and therapeutic targets, and development of novel anti-cancer strategies.
Outstanding achievements in 2020 in the NCCRI include following:
(1) Elucidation of novel carcinogenic mechanisms based on worldwide largest pan-cancer genome analyses
(2) Development of high-throughput functional evaluation for variants of unknown significance
(3) Identification of a highly accurate predictive biomarker about clinical efficacy of immune checkpoint blockades
(4) Discovery of phenomenon showing vaginal transmission of cancer from mother with cervical cancer to infant
In collaboration with NCC hospitals, the NCCRI has established the J-PDX library, which contains more than 400 PDXs from clinical specimens, and promoted the collaborative studies with industry and academia using the library. Furthermore, in collaboration with the Center for Cancer Genomics and Advanced Therapeutics, the NCCRI is supporting cancer genomic medicine in Japan, and is constructing a system for the whole genome analysis of cancer.
The NCCRI also actively participates in and leads worldwide cancer research collaborations including International Cancer Genome Consortium (ICGC), International Human Epigenome Consortium (IHEC) and International Cancer Proteogenome Consortium (ICPC). Furthermore, the NCCRI has continued the collaborative research to elucidate the carcinogenic mechanism of various cancers with The Wellcome Sanger Institute of the United Kingdom and the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IRAC, WHO).
As described above, through enhancing high-quality research and the interaction with many domestic and international institutes, the NCCRI is eagerly generating novel modalities to prevent and conquer cancer.
Hiroyuki Mano, M.D., Ph.D.
Director, National Cancer Center Research Institute