ASCO award set to boost Asian cancer research

Medical Tribune September 2009 P8
David Brill

A Singapore oncologist has become the first Singaporean, and one of the first Asia-based recipients, to pick up a prestigious research award from the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO).

Dr. Daniel Tan of the National Cancer Centre Singapore (NCCS) will receive a US$50,000 grant as part of the Young Investigator Award, bestowed by the ASCO cancer foundation.

The money will help fund his research on the molecular mechanisms of tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) in nasopharyngeal cancer. The work aims to understand why some patients respond better to targeted therapies than others – so as to improve patient selection and avoid unnecessary exposure to ineffective treatment and side effects.

“One of the challenges with any of these new-generation drugs is to find out how we can use them better – to get the right drug to the right patient. Understanding the reasons for response and resistance can also allow us to develop much more effective treatment strategies that hopefully translate to improved survival,” said Tan, who will work alongside his mentor Professor Teh Bin Tean, director of the NCCS-VARI laboratory – a joint project with the Michigan-based Van Andel Research Institute.

Tan’s ASCO proposal was borne out of clinical observations from a phase II trial of pazopanib, which saw a subset of nasopharyngeal cancer patients respond better to therapy than others. This trial is currently ongoing under principal investigator Dr. Darren Lim, a senior consultant at NCCS specializing in thoracic and head and neck cancers.

The goal now is to understand which proteins are targeted by the drug, and how this differs between patients and tumor types. Tan’s work will be done largely in a series of co-culture experiments and mouse xenograft models – allowing detailed analysis of how the drug affects each cellular compartment within a tumor.

Tan is also aiming to secure more local funding for his research, and hopes in the long term to help establish a comprehensive drug development program, which would also provide patients with access to novel therapeutic agents.

He added that he was pleased to receive the award, and is especially encouraged that the proposal was deemed to have sufficient scientific merit for further study.

“It is heartening to know that one’s ideas are being taken seriously by a highly regarded scientific body. Furthermore, the award is rarely given out to institutions outside of America, so it’s a nice endorsement of the research infrastructure at NCCS,” he said.