SEATTLE–Sage Bionetworks has been selected by the National Cancer Institute (NCI) Integrative Cancer Biology Program (ICBP) to establish a new interdisciplinary research and training center.

“Integrating Cancer Datasets for Predictive Model Development and Training”

“We are thrilled to receive the strong support from NCI and to join the other Centers for Cancer Systems Biology (CCSB),” said Stephen Friend, Sage Bionetworks President. “We are particularly pleased that they share our view on the critical importance of training.”

The grant entitled “Integrating Cancer Datasets for Predictive Model Development and Training” will provide a baseline of $6.7m to support the Center’s operation and the training of four postdoctoral researchers each year.

Dr. Dan Gallahan, the Director of the NCI Integrative Cancer Biology Program said, “Sage Bionetworks’ training and research program as well as the developing Sage Commons platform bring a new dimension and I am excited to have their participation in the NCI ICBP centers program.”

“This prestigious grant is a wonderful endorsement for our young organization and validates our vision to establish a contributor-based integrative genomics and network biology resource to accelerate drug development,” Dr. Friend added. “Advanced predictive models of cancer, built through a network analysis of complex molecular and clinical datasets, are increasingly poised to inform drug development and clinical care decisions.”

Sage Bionetworks is a new nonprofit medical research organization established in 2009 to establish a novel research community Commons.

“Sage was established based on three themes; biomedical research, integrative genomics platform building and training. These three tenets establish a foundation for a Commons that will ultimately enable the sharing of large comprehensive datasets and models among scientists,” said Dr. Jonathan Derry, Sage’s Research Director and the Center’s administrative leader. “This new NCI Center represents the first component of our training mission.”

“Interdisciplinary bridges are essential for the development and use of genomic technologies. For this reason we have chosen to train paired mathematicians/physicists and biologist/clinicians so that they can cross-fertilize each other’s thinking.” Dr. Friend added. “Such interactions often form the spark of innovation.”

Prof. Bert Vogelstein, Director of the Ludwig Center for Cancer Genetics & Therapeutics at Johns Hopkins University, commented, “We are delighted to be a part of this novel collaborative center and to provide our comprehensive cancer analysis data as part of the foundation for the Commons platform.” He added, “High throughput integrative genomics will strengthen our understanding of cancer and our ability to predict clinical outcomes based on molecular data.”

Sage Bionetworks will collaborate with the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, The Johns Hopkins University, The Dana Farber Cancer Institute, The University of Hong Kong and the Netherlands Cancer Institute as well as with the other ICBP Centers. The research projects will initially focus on breast, colon, liver and pancreatic cancer. The resultant computational models will be validated in the laboratory to test their accuracy as well as to help refine and improve the models.

About the ICBP Program:

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) Integrative Cancer Biology Program (ICBP) supports eleven Centers for Cancer Systems Biology (CCSBs) distributed across the US. Begun in 2004, the current participants include Sloan-Kettering, MIT, Broad Institute, Caritas St. Elizabeth, Methodist Hospital, Georgetown, Ohio State, Vanderbilt, Stanford and Lawrence Berkeley. The Centers are highly interactive and collaborate with other NCI programs and grantees.

ICBP is an interdisciplinary program bringing together talented researchers from experimental biology, medicine, math, physics, information technology, imaging and computer science. Viewing cancer as a complex biological system, ICBP’s central theme is the development of computational models related to cancer prevention diagnosis and therapeutics. A key feature of the program is the focus on building predictive models of cancer rather than just analyzing data. There is a further pragmatic emphasis on testing the models to validate the usefulness in research, drug development and health care. For more information go to: www.icbp.nci.nih.gov

About Sage Bionetworks:

Sage Bionetworks is a new nonprofit medical research organization established to revolutionize how researchers approach the complexity of human biological information and the treatment of disease. Sage works with academic and commercial partners on comprehensive molecular and clinical datasets in order to create validated disease models that improve the speed and efficiency of therapeutic drug development. Sage’s vision is to create an open access, integrative bionetwork evolved by contributor scientists working to eliminate human disease. For more information visit: www.sagebase.org.