Jan. 4, 2016:

A conversation with Arkadiusz Dudek, MD, PhD, professor of medicine, hematology/oncology, at the University of Illinois College of Medicine. Dr. Dudek is a member of both the University of Illinois Cancer Center and the BTCRC Steering Committee.

Q: How do you think cancer research will change in the next 10 to 20 years?

Portable technology is changing research every day. From apps to scanners, information transmission is faster than ever before. In development at the University of Illinois is a portable blood drop test for lung cancer screening. The way a drop of blood can alter the course of daily treatment for a diabetic, will hopefully have the similar path to recognize lung cancer at earliest stage and aid with patient selection for screening with low dose spiral computed tomography. The UI Cancer Center also works very closely with SAWBO, Scientific Animations Without Borders, which is a global media depository that develops universal tools to understand medical problems, in this case education about a need for cancer screening. This portable technology is another instrument that has the potential to expand comprehension in innumerable ways. Read More

Dec. 1, 2015:

A conversation with George Weiner, MD, director of Holden Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Iowa and the C.E. Block Chair of Cancer Research and professor of internal medicine at the University of Iowa, which is a member of the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium. Dr. Weiner has led a statewide collaborative to reduce the burden of cancer in Iowa, served on committees within the National Cancer Institute, and is currently serving a two-year term as president of the Association of American Cancer Institutes (AACI), which comprises 92 leading cancer research centers in the United States.

Q: How do you think cancer research will change in the next 10 to 20 years?

Rapid changes in cancer research are taking place in multiple dimensions at the same time. We are learning more every day about the incredible complexity of cancer genetics, cell biology, and how cancer interacts with normal tissues in the body including with the immune system. The big challenge is to continue to accelerate progress in our ability to understand cancer, and to use the information we have found to help as many patients as possible. This is requiring a new team approach to cancer research that includes basic cancer biologists, experts in informatics, clinical investigators, clinicians and many others. These teams are necessary to sort through the complexity of cancer and develop new approaches to cancer prevention, early detection and therapy, and to use the resulting new knowledge to select the right clinical approach for each individual patient. Read More

Nov. 2, 2015:

A conversation with Patrick J. Loehrer, Sr., MD, director of the Indiana University Melvin and Bren Simon Cancer Center, which is a member of the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium:

Q: How do you think cancer research will change in the next 10 or 20 years?

Cancer therapy, like much of medicine, is quite empiric. Understanding greater details of what drives tumors to grow will be greatly enhanced in the next several years. We are in the onset of the age of cancer informatics and immunotherapy. The information overload will need to be simplified into bite-size pieces of relevant information that can better identify the complex biological engineering of the cancer cell that nature has designed. Immunotherapy is already unleashing tremendous new opportunities, especially for highly mutated tumors from the therapeutic armamentarium. We have so much more to learn about the great potential and the limitations of this approach. These are truly exciting times. Read More

Oct. 1, 2015:

A conversation with Timothy L. Ratliff, PhD, Robert Wallace Miller Director of the Purdue University Center for Cancer Research, which is a member of the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium.

Q: How do you think cancer research will change in the next 10 or 20 years?

There will be a much greater focus on individual care, i.e., personalized medicine. I am hopeful that the FDA will make changes that embody the personalized approach. There is likely to be significant advances in immunotherapy and control of epigenetic gene regulation. Read More

Aug. 31, 2015:

A conversation with Howard Bailey, MD, director of the UW Carbone Cancer Center, which is a member of the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium (Big Ten CRC):

Q: How do you think cancer research will change in the next 10-20 years?

The increased collection of clinical information will lead to increased numbers of specific, potential directions to pursue unlike in the past when any new direction was embraced and pursued. The future of cancer research will involve much more “virtual research” or informatics confirmation prior to pursing a direction clinically and the need to work together to identify cancer patients with shared “personalized cancer data” for innovative targeted or personalized treatments. Read More

July 1, 2015:

A conversation with Douglas Yee, MD, director, and Jeffrey Miller, MD, deputy director, of the Masonic Cancer Center, University of Minnesota, which is a member of the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium (Big Ten CRC):

Q: How do you think cancer research will change in the next 10-20 years?

Douglas Yee, MD (DY): In the coming years, patients will see more precise and personalized therapies due to targeted tumor profiling. Personalized medicine is the wave of the future, and we’re excited to have some incredibly strong researchers in areas like bone marrow transplant, NK cell research, and cell products.

Jeff Miller, MD (JM): Here at the Masonic Cancer Center, we are addressing this shift by investing resources into space, equipment and most importantly, recruitment of talent for a new Translational Genomics in GI Tract Cancer (TGG) team. By creating a transdisciplinary team focused on a common goal, backed by extensive support and infrastructure, we plan to be intentional about finding answers to therapy resistance, for example. Read More

June 1, 2015:

A conversation with Kenneth H. Cowan, MD, PhD, director of Fred & Pamela Buffett Cancer Center (University of Nebraska), which is a member of the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium (Big Ten CRC):

Q: How do you think cancer research will change in the next 10 or 20 years?

Cancer research will move toward precision cancer medicine. Using genomics and other new diagnostic tools, we will be able to employ precision medicine to customize therapies, care for each cancer patient individually, and ultimately improve outcomes. We are investing more efforts into personalized treatments including a partnership with IBM to conduct early testing and feedback for IBM’s Watson Genomic Analytics program. In minutes, the program identifies relevant mutations and potential drugs that may be considered in a treatment regime – all based on the patient’s genomic profile and the specific mutations. The Fred & Pamela Buffett Cancer Center is one of 14 leading cancer institutes to partner on the project. We’re really proud to have this program as part of our research and treatment planning options. Read More

May 1, 2015:

A conversation with Robert S. DiPaola, MD, director of Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey, which is a member of the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium.

Q: How do you think cancer research will change in the next 10 or 20 years?

Over the last 20 years, the development of powerful new technologies was instrumental in what we have come to understand about the complexity and heterogeneity of cancer, from the role of genetic mutations to the behavior of our immune systems.

The accomplishments of the last 20 years, more than any other period in cancer research, have set the stage for remarkably accelerated progress over the next 20 years, by teams that push the limits of what we imagined “multidisciplinary” could mean. Precision medicine teams that are working to create combination therapies to target the multiple genetic mutations in any individual cancer patient include physicists, mathematicians, and computer scientists. The challenges we face in understanding large-scale outcomes of such targeted therapies will require cooperation among research, clinical care, government, and insurance institutions. As our understanding of the biology of cancer and the human genome continues to evolve, our ability to create tailored treatments for patients and prevention strategies for well populations will improve dramatically. Read More

April 2, 2015:

A conversation with Maha Hussain, MD, FACP, FASCO, associate director of clinical research at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center, which is a member of the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium.

Q: What kind of impact do you see the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium having on cancer clinical trials?

Conquering cancer requires impactful research that is efficiently implemented and evaluated in clinical trials that are timely, appropriately designed, and skillfully performed and analyzed. This requires team effort.

Collaborating with other institutions allows for a broader and deeper brain trust while allowing the efficient testing of novel concepts and approaches in a more representative patient population. The synergist interactions, the collaboration, the implementation — all are aimed at one ultimate goal: Making a real difference for patients and their families. Read More

March 2, 2015:

A conversation with Leonidas Platanias, MD, PhD, director of the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center of Northwestern University, which is a member of the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium.

Q: What kind of impact do you see the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium having on cancer clinical trials?

Our member institutions each have unique strengths and resources; the Big Ten Cancer Research Consortium (Big Ten CRC) provides the necessary structure to use those resources to the best advantage and expedite the development of effective, innovative clinical research. The consortium’s ability to streamline processes from clinical trial design to implementation expands opportunities for our cancer centers to make the most of limited funding. In addition, the Big Ten CRC’s focus on collaboration will help ensure that young investigators receive mentorship and support to advance their concepts and develop new therapies. Read More