The SU2C-Torrey Coast Foundation Gastroesophageal Cancer Dream Team Collective includes three Research Teams focused on bringing new therapies to clinical trials for the treatment of gastroesophageal cancer in diverse populations. This Collective aims to foster new and inclusive cancer research on the causes and treatments of gastroesophageal cancer, mentor a new generation of scientists focused on gastroesophageal cancer research, bring new treatments to the clinic, and provide medical professionals with tools and materials to better advocate for gastroesophageal cancer screening and treatment with their patients. This Research Team is specifically focused on the application, translation and discovery of therapeutics for gastroesophageal adenocarcinoma.

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The SU2C-Torrey Coast Foundation Gastroesophageal Cancer Dream Team Collective includes three Research Teams focused on bringing new therapies to clinical trials for the treatment of gastroesophageal cancer in diverse populations. This Collective aims to foster new and inclusive cancer research on the causes and treatments of gastroesophageal cancer, mentor a new generation of scientists focused on gastroesophageal cancer research, bring new treatments to the clinic, and provide medical professionals with tools and materials to better advocate for gastroesophageal cancer screening and treatment with their patients. This Research Team is specifically focused on creating novel therapeutic approaches for esophageal squamous cell carcinoma by eliminating an unfavorable metabolic environment for tumor growth.

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The SU2C-Torrey Coast Foundation Gastroesophageal Cancer Dream Team Collective includes three Research Teams focused on bringing new therapies to clinical trials for the treatment of gastroesophageal cancer in diverse populations. This Collective aims to foster new and inclusive cancer research on the causes and treatments of gastroesophageal cancer, mentor a new generation of scientists focused on gastroesophageal cancer research, bring new treatments to the clinic, and provide medical professionals with tools and materials to better advocate for gastroesophageal cancer screening and treatment with their patients. This Research Team is specifically focused on targeting immune evasion in gastroesophageal cancer for up to 70% of patients for whom current treatments don’t work.

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This team from Fox Chase Cancer Center will focus on accelerating and diversifying access to clinical trials. Their approach to improve access to early phase clinical trials, specifically in the predominantly underserved North Philadelphia community, includes three main goals: develop infrastructure and personnel to extend early phase clinical trials; provide extensive patient support and services for early phase clinical trial participants; and leverage community and patient engagement to increase education while integrating existing services to support clinical trial participation. This team, led by Martin Edelman, MD, and co-led by Linda Fleisher, PhD, MPH, anticipates a 20% increase in accrual to early phase cancer clinical trials as a result of this program, resulting in a positive influence on the overall quality and delivery of care.

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This team from the University of Southern California Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center (USC Norris) will focus on several tactics to improve diverse recruitment for early phase cancer clinical trials: engage oncology care providers in a safety net hospital system to identify the referral barriers that currently exist; implement a series of interventions to address system barriers as well as those faced by patients and providers and evaluate the impact of these interventions on recruitment; explore the feasibility of remote clinical trials in communities where time and distance from accessible care and transportation to appointments are the key barriers; and examine the collected information and apply processes such as increasing targeted communication between providers and patients, and promoting trial awareness through community engagement events, in outpatient clinics and on social media platforms. Led by Anthony El-Khoueiry, MD, associate director for clinical research at USC Norris, and co-led by Chanita Hughes Halbert, PhD, associate director for cancer equity at USC Norris, the transdisciplinary team’s goal is to improve the clinical trial recruitment process at the patient level, the provider level and the overall system level.

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This team from the University of Chicago will focus on enhancing diversity in early phase clinical trials in an urban underserved community, namely Chicago’s Southside and a community hospital within the health system that serves a predominantly Black patient base. The team’s randomized trial will determine if employing new methods of patient outreach, with or without engagement of a community ambassador, enhances clinical trial enrollment above and beyond outreach to the treating physician alone. Led by Walter Stadler, MD, and co-led by Briseis Aschebrook-Kilfoy, PhD, the team will identify potential trial patients through a method utilizing the electronic health record, and then inform the treating physician of possible trial eligibility prior to the patient’s visit. Patients in various outreach groups will receive a variety of digital communications such as electronic health record messaging, email and text messaging informing them about clinical trials and the trial process before and after their physician visit. Physicians for these patients will also receive training on culturally appropriate communication. Certain patients participating in the study will additionally be given the opportunity to connect with community ambassadors from established community-based organizations already working with the team. The goal of the study is to identify which mix of patient outreach and communication works best, build upon established community relationships, and triple diverse participant clinical trial enrollment.

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This team from UT Southwestern Medical Center’s Harold C. Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center will implement a program to screen and recruit patients from a safety-net medical system, then enroll them in early phase cancer clinical trials at a university-based National Cancer Institute-designated cancer center. The team, led by David Gerber, MD, and co-led by Chika Nwachukwu, MD, PhD, aims to promote diverse and equitable access to early phase cancer clinical trials for patients from the Dallas area, which is critical to informing the development of new cancer therapies. Dr. David Gerber currently serves on an advisory board for Janssen.

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The Southeastern Consortium for Lung Cancer Health Equity (SC3), led by Dr. Robert A. Winn, assembles an outstanding interdisciplinary team of translational researchers positioned in the heart of the historical and current tobacco-producing region within the southeast. Collectively, SC3’s investigative team has unparalleled experience in lung cancer screening, translational research in lung cancer health disparities, community outreach and engagement, and recruiting and retaining racial and ethnic minorities and individuals from other medically underserved groups using evidence-based strategies. As NCI-designated cancer centers, all three centers report high enrollment of underserved minorities onto interventional trials and are committed to reducing the substantial disparities found in lung cancer outcomes in their collective Black/African American and rural communities.

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The goal of the SU2C-Fanconi Anemia Research Fund-Farrah Fawcett Foundation Head and Neck Cancer Research Team, with additional support from American Head and Neck Society and the Head and Neck Cancer Alliance, is to develop improved treatments for patients with head and neck cancer. This research will explore combinations of existing and emerging treatments for head and neck squamous cell cancers (HNSCC), especially for people with the human papillomavirus (HPV) or Fanconi anemia — a rare disease that leads to bone marrow failure and cancer.

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The SU2C-CRUK Pediatric Cancer New Discoveries Challenge is a new, focused effort to spark novel approaches and new collaborations from investigators both within and outside the field of pediatric cancer research, with the ultimate aim of increasing the number of innovative and effective approaches to treating pediatric cancers. This program will support collaborative, multi-disciplinary, multi-institutional, trans-Atlantic Teams to pursue a transformative change in our understanding of the drivers of pediatric cancers and the development of novel or repurposed medicines, treatment strategies or technologies. With a clear and rational line of sight to the clinic, these projects will have the potential to significantly impact pediatric cancer patients, including teenagers and young adults.

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The SU2C-CRUK Pediatric Cancer New Discoveries Challenge is a new, focused effort to spark novel approaches and new collaborations from investigators both within and outside the field of pediatric cancer research, with the ultimate aim of increasing the number of innovative and effective approaches to treating pediatric cancers. This program will support collaborative, multi-disciplinary, multi-institutional, trans-Atlantic Teams to pursue a transformative change in our understanding of the drivers of pediatric cancers and the development of novel or repurposed medicines, treatment strategies or technologies. With a clear and rational line of sight to the clinic, these projects will have the potential to significantly impact pediatric cancer patients, including teenagers and young adults.

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The SU2C-CRUK Pediatric Cancer New Discoveries Challenge is a new, focused effort to spark novel approaches and new collaborations from investigators both within and outside the field of pediatric cancer research, with the ultimate aim of increasing the number of innovative and effective approaches to treating pediatric cancers. This program will support collaborative, multi-disciplinary, multi-institutional, trans-Atlantic Teams to pursue a transformative change in our understanding of the drivers of pediatric cancers and the development of novel or repurposed medicines, treatment strategies or technologies. With a clear and rational line of sight to the clinic, these projects will have the potential to significantly impact pediatric cancer patients, including teenagers and young adults.

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Gastric (stomach) cancer is the third-leading cause of cancer death worldwide. New ways are needed to detect this cancer early, when it can be successfully treated. This research team is working to identify biomarkers, such as particular bits of DNA or cells shed from the tumor, that circulate in the blood system and indicate the presence of gastric cancer. The team has also developed a new detection technology using a pill-sized camera that can be swallowed by the patient and a marker that “lights up” cancer cells. This may enable researchers to capture images of stomach tissue at risk of developing cancer. If validated in a clinical trial, these methods will help doctors screen people in groups at risk of gastric cancer.

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The goal of this team’s research is to develop a tool that uses advances in machine learning analysis of clinical records and images to identify patients with an elevated risk of pancreatic cancer.

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This interdisciplinary, multi‐institutional, and international team will focus on developing a collection of biomarkers that predict an individual’s risk of developing pancreatic cancer. Samples will be obtained from large clinical and molecular datasets, and the research will be complemented by the identification of tumor microenvironmental factors to create a screening tool for pancreatic cancer risk.

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Pancreatic cancer cells have a high level of a protein, called TGF-β, that can repress the activity of the immune system in fighting cancers. This research team can isolate tumor-specific killer T cells (called tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes, or TILs) from pancreatic cancer tissue and transfer them back to the patient for maximal impact against the tumor cells. The team is engineering TIL to make the cells resistant to the suppressive effect of TGF-β, potentially enabling the TIL to attack the cancer tissue within the pancreas.

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The standard of care for people with pancreatic cancer is difficult and often ineffective. To better control this type of cancer, the research team is testing a combination approach that involves shutting down two cellular pathways. The first pathway carries signals that relate to tumor growth, and the second controls a process called autophagy, in which the cell effectively reuses its own interior contents. By shutting down both pathways, the team hopes to slow or stop the growth of pancreatic tumors.

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Drugs called PARP inhibitors are being used to treat ovarian cancer by interfering with the processes of cell division that allows tumors to grow. Based on preclinical work suggesting a combination of first-line therapy gemcitabine with other drugs that block cellular pathways also involved in DNA repair, the team is testing three combinations in clinical trials. It is hoped that together, these therapies will in many cases cause pancreatic tumors to shrink.

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Mutations in the KRAS oncogene drive the vast majority of pancreatic cancers. This research team used knowledge of the immune system and innovative bioinformatic, biochemistry and cell biology strategies to isolate T cells that can target the cancer-promoting gene. The team is studying two novel precision therapies involving highly selective white blood cells that can be given to patients with resected pancreatic cancer and will then study the most promising of these vaccines in patients with metastatic pancreatic cancer.

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This team proposes the protein called integrin αvβ6 as a target for peptide receptor radionuclide therapy (PRRT), an approved molecular targeted therapy used to treat neuroendocrine tumors. αvβ6 is significantly increased in pancreatic cancer, especially in metastasis. The scientists have developed a radiolabeled αvβ6-targeting peptide that they have successfully used to image pancreatic cancer metastases. In this study they are developing and testing a similar peptide, 177Lu-αvβ6-BP, to evaluate the safety and efficacy of that treatment in patients with locally advanced, or metastatic pancreatic cancer, and determine the most effective dose to be studied in a Phase II clinical trial.

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The team is studying whether inhibiting cellular processes in pancreatic tumors can stop the out-of-control growth that is characteristic of cancer. Pancreatic cancers with mutations in the KRAS gene are weakened when a protein called SHP2 is blocked in the RAS pathway—a cellular pathway that may be essential to the growth of pancreatic cancer cells. Another means to block this pathway involves a protein called MEK. In Round 1 pre-clinical work, the team has shown that inhibiting both of these components, they can better control growth of pancreatic cancer tumors. In Round 2, the team will test the combination in a phase 1/1b clinical trial to better understand how this double inhibition works and to inform continued clinical trials.

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Researchers on this team have identified a subpopulation of cells in pancreatic cancer that act like stem cells and help the cancer to proliferate. The team has also found that these cells are especially resistant to therapeutic drugs but may be sensitive to a new approach. The team is testing whether blocking a protein that regulates inflammation can slow or stop the growth of pancreatic cancer. Promising drugs in this class are already in development for autoimmune diseases, so if this approach is successful, doctors may be able to deploy it rapidly to develop new treatments for pancreatic cancer.

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To intercept pancreatic cancer, the SU2C–Lustgarten Foundation For Pancreatic Research Interception Research Team is taking a comprehensive, two-pronged approach. Team members are testing novel and intensive preoperative treatments allowing doctors to achieve a complete surgical removal of a tumor and eradicate micrometastatic disease in more patients. They are also using organoids-cultured tumor cell colonies―to identify robust biomarkers of response to help guide the choice of standard therapies and immunotherapies.

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The SU2C-LUNGevity-American Lung Association (ALA) Lung Cancer Interception Research Team hypothesizes that the early detection of invasive lung cancers can be improved through new technological approaches, and that progress on this front can quickly bring about more effective patient treatments. hypothesizes that the early detection of invasive lung cancers can be improved through new technological approaches, and that progress on this front can quickly bring about more effective patient treatments. The team is working to build a new tool―a composite of blood-based biomarker tests called the Lung Cancer Interception Assay―that can be used in conjunction with standard imaging to provide early detection of lung cancer.

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CAR T therapy, a therapeutic strategy to use the patient’s immune cells to fight cancer, has been promising with blood cancers but seems less effective in treating solid cancers. The SU2C–Lustgarten Foundation CAR T Research Team is using state-of-the-art epigenetic approaches and preclinical models to examine CAR T cells and tumor cells in patients who respond to CAR T therapy and in those who do not, with a particular focus on pancreatic cancer patients.

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The SU2C–Farrah Fawcett Foundation Human Papillomavirus (HPV) Research Team focuses on patients with HPV-driven cancers (including cervical, anal, and head and neck cancer) who relapse following initial therapy. The team aims to develop novel immunotherapy approaches that will address this important unmet clinical need.

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The ultimate goal of personalized, or “precision,” medicine—delivering the right drug to the right cancer patient—requires a detailed understanding of how alterations in tumor DNA are linked to responses to cancer drugs. The SU2C−Dutch Cancer Society (DCS) Translational Research Team studies how changes in the tumor DNA of patients can be used to predict sensitivity to specific anticancer agents.

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