DGAP-News: New platform for predictive modelling of cancer signalling: European Consortium 'CanPathPro' started


DGAP-News: Alacris Theranostics GmbH / Key word(s): Alliance
New platform for predictive modelling of cancer signalling: European
Consortium 'CanPathPro' started

29.04.2016 / 09:00
The issuer is solely responsible for the content of this announcement.

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New platform for predictive modelling of cancer signalling: European
Consortium "CanPathPro" started

An international group of scientists from 6 countries bring together their
expertise to develop a combined experimental and systems biology platform
for predictive modelling of cancer signalling. The EU Horizon 2020 funded
project, co-ordinated by Alacris Theranostics GmbH, Berlin, will run for 5
years with a budget of almost 11 million euros.

Only a few decades ago cancer was invariably a fatal disease. Nowadays,
cancer screening and ever-emerging new therapies have significantly
decreased the mortality rate, despite the higher incidence of cancer in the
ageing European population. However, the great molecular complexity and
heterogeneity exhibited by most cancers, is - still - a huge challenge in
cancer treatment.

Recent technological developments have enabled the generation of molecular
datasets that are exponentially increasing the knowledge base on cancer.
Yet, a systems biology-based approach is required to understand the
cross-talk between pathways as well as the underlying molecular basis of
cancer development and progression. New solutions to optimally exploit this
wealth of data for basic research, better treatment and stratification of
patients, as well as more efficient targeted drug development are required.
The European Research Consortium CanPathPro now takes a unique approach and
brings together classic cancer research with omics data and systems biology
tools, to develop and validate a new biotechnological application: a
combined systems and experimental biology platform for generating and
testing cancer signalling hypotheses in biomedical research.

Previous bioinformatic attempts in this direction have been confined to
pattern recognition or, at best, modelling of single pathways. Such
approaches often cannot take into account the complexity of living
organisms, comprising numerous pathways and their cross-talk. These
features are of paramount significance in cancer, where signalling
complexity is the major determinant of disease progression and drug
response.

To achieve its objective, CanPathPro will develop and refine bioinformatic
and experimental tools for the evaluation of systems biology modelling
predictions. Components comprise highly defined mouse and organotypic
experimental systems, next generation sequencing, quantitative proteomics
and a systems biology computational model for data integration,
visualisation and predictive modelling.

The CanPathPro-generated platform will enable in silico (computer-based)
identification of cancer signalling networks critical for tumour
development and will allow users to predict activation status of individual
pathways, following integration of user (or public) data sets in the
pathway models.

The in silico modelling and high-performance computing tools will provide
completely new solutions for researchers, SMEs and industry for
interpretation and analysis of omics data as well as for deriving and
testing new hypotheses. Thus, prediction of cancer progression and drug
efficacy shall be maximised in order to, in the long run, significantly
improve outcomes for the majority of cancer patients.

Project Information:

CanPathPro ("Generation of the CanPath prototype - a platform for
predictive cancer pathway modelling") has received funding from the
European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant
agreement No. 686282 (10 million euros) and 0.85 million euros from the
Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI). The
5-year project started on 1st March 2016.

The project is coordinated by Alacris Theranostics GmbH (Germany) and
carried out by leading European research institutions and SMEs:
PHENOMIN-ICS (France); Netherlands Cancer Institute (Netherlands); Leibniz
Institute on Aging - Fritz-Lipmann Institute (Germany); Helmholtz Zentrum
München GmbH (Germany); Spanish National Research Council (CSIC, Spain);
Biognosys AG (Switzerland); Simula Research Laboratory AS (Norway);
Finovatis SAS (France).

Contact: 

Dr Bodo Lange
Phone: + 49 30 8431 22 510 
Email: info@alacris.de 

www.canpathpro.eu

MC Services AG 
Anne Hennecke, Managing Partner 
Tel.: +49 211 529 252 22
Email: anne.hennecke@mc-services.eu


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458975 29.04.2016