Center for Promotion of Translational Research
Toshihiko Doi, Katsuya Tsuchihara, Wakako Toga, Yoshikatsu Koga, Masahiro Yasunaga, Shingo Sakashita, Daichi Ota, Kyoko Minamoto, Hirotaka Tanaka, Mitsuyoshi Yoshimoto, Akihiro Ohashi, Akinobu Hamada, Yoshinori Ikarashi, Hiroki Sasaki, Mami Takahashi, Akihiro Sato, Takayuki Yoshino, Masaaki Ito, Katsuji Aikawa, Nobuyoshi Takeshita, Yutaka Tomioka, Takuya Ishi, Noboru Yamamoto, Natsuko Okita, Nobuko Ushirozawa, Takeshi Morishita
Introduction
The main purpose of the Center is to standardize and share information on translational research support at the National Cancer Center, which is a Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology-accredited institution for supporting translational research, to discover and foster academic seeds inside and outside the NCC, and to train researchers and research support experts.
The Team and What We Do
The Director of the Center for Promotion of Translational Research (CPOT) was concurrently appointed by the Director of the Exploratory Oncology Research and Clinical Trial Center (EPOC). Working members at the EPOC, Research Institute, National Cancer Center Hospital and Hospital East, and CRAS, the deputy directors of these departments participated, in addition to the full-time employees of the CPOT. The CPOT will maximize the results and value of academic research through exit-oriented research support, utilizing a support system based on abundant experience in basic research and clinical development at both campuses, as well as the ability and experiences for social implementation in the field of oncology.
Research Activities
As a Supporting Organization for the AMED Translational Research Program, CPOT selected, managed, and evaluated 18 AMED-supported projects (Seeds A) (including 6 outside the NCC). From these, 2 projects were selected for the AMED-supported projects (preF), 1 project was selected for the AMED Drug discovery infrastructure promotion research project, 1 project was selected for JSPS Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research (KAKENHI), and 2 projects were introduced to manufacturing companies. In addition, as the secretariat for the Emerging Research Program of the NCC, which discovers and nurtures early-stage seeds, we selected seven new proposals and conducted project management and evaluation. From these, 2 projects were selected for the AMED-supported projects (Seeds A) in FY2024.
Education
The CPOT hired 3 full-time staff members specializing in supporting research projects at the basic and applied research stages. Seminars on conducting non-clinical research were held for researchers and research supporters inside and outside the NCC, with lecturers from pharmaceutical companies. In addition, lecture-series seminars on “Cancer vaccine, Gene-editing, Regenerative medicine”, “Radio-theranostics”, “Cancer Imaging” were organized to provide systematic overview of new technologies that will become pillars of drug discovery research.
Future Prospects
In addition to external seed holders and pharmaceutical, medical device, and diagnostic companies, we will collaborate more closely with CDMO (Contract Development and Manufacturing Organization) and support industries and academia to develop unique and novel seeds that are adapted to the latest drug discovery environment, and platform-type seeds (regenerative cell therapy, internal radiation therapy, antibody-drug conjugates, etc.) that can be horizontally expanded to multiple cancer types and non-cancer diseases. A framework will be established to support medical start-ups originating from academia.