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On 10-11th December, we celebrated 5 years since the launch of OxCODE with a showcase of Oxford’s most successful cancer early detection and prevention programmes.

In an oversubscribed event, we welcomed 210 members of the OxCODE community, our patient and public representatives and attendees from other academic and clinical institutions, industry and charities to our annual celebration of Oxford’s cancer early detection and prevention research.

Day 1

OxCODE Director Xin Lu got proceedings underway with a summary of the impressive achievements in cancer early detection and prevention by OxCODE members in the past five years since OxCODE’s launch.

Victor Velculescu gave a talk on DNA fragmentomics for early detectionVictor Velculescu gave a talk on DNA fragmentomics for early detectionIn the first session on Technologies for Early Detection and Prevention, we were delighted to host Victor Velculescu (Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine) as our first keynote speaker. Victor shared his work on cell-free DNA fragmentomics for early detection of a variety of cancers. Continuing with technologies, James McCullagh (Department of Chemistry) discussed metabolomics for early detection and Sarah Blagden (Department of Oncology) and Eleni Adamopoulou (Centre for Immuno-oncology, Nuffield Department of Medicine) described their use of immunopeptidomics to discover vaccine targets to prevent BRCA-associated cancers.

 

Session 2 featured a lively panel discussion on important considerations for translating cancer early detection and prevention research for patient benefit, with Hazel Beaver (patient and public representative), Claire Brown (Oxford Science Enterprises), Anna Dowrick (Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences) and Victor Velculescu (Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine).

Last before lunch, we heard lightning talks from OxCODE Funding Scheme recipients Lucy Denly (Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research) on the analysis of whole genome urinary DNA methylation for earlier detection of bladder cancer recurrence and Dimitris Vavoulis (Centre for Human Genetics and Department of Oncology) on the use of Nanopore whole genome sequencing of liquid biopsies for cancer detection, OxCODE travel award recipient, Yi-Jhih Huang (Department of Oncology) on targeting c-Met for endoscopic detection of dysplastic lesions within Barrett’s oesophagus, and Lucy Goudswaard (University of Bristol) on using Mendelian randomisation to identify circulating proteins involved in multiple myeloma risk. These vignettes stimulated a well-attended poster session over lunch, with posters from OxCODE researchers and other UK academics.

The third session focused on Oxford’s recent advances in the field of vaccines for cancer prevention, with Catriona Gilmour Hamilton (Oxford Cancer) and Anna Fry (patient and public representative) sharing the importance of and lessons learned so far from PPI consultations on the research to use vaccines to prevent cancer. We also heard from two recently CRUK-funded cancer vaccine projects on preventing ovarian cancer (by Nancy Zaarour, Nuffield Department of Women’s and Reproductive Health) and Lynch syndrome-associated cancers (by David Church, Centre for Human Genetics, Nuffield Department of Medicine).

Dame Molly Stevens spoke about her technologies that could be applied to early cancer detectionDame Molly Stevens spoke about her technologies that could be applied to early cancer detectionIn our final session of day 1 on Early Detection Technologies, Fergus Gleeson shared the outputs from the DART project in lung cancer screening and Michael Pavlides (Radcliffe Department of Medicine) described a project comparing abbreviated MRI with standard-of-care ultrasound surveillance for liver cancer detection, building on the DeLIVER programme. Finishing up, we were honoured to hear from keynote speaker Dame Molly Stevens (Kavli Institute Oxford), who discussed an impressive array of new bioengineering approaches to treat and detect cancer.

 

Day 2

Sam Janes described his work on pre-invasive lung cancerSam Janes described his work on pre-invasive lung cancerAfter a successful first day, the second day began with a session on Early Cancer Biology featuring Asger Jacobsen (MRC Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine) on pre-leukaemic clonal selection and Simon Leedham (Centre for Human Genetics, Nuffield Department of Medicine) on spatial biology to understand colorectal cancer development. We also warmly welcomed our keynote speaker in the early cancer biology session, Sam Janes (University College London), who gave a fascinating summary of his research on pre-invasive lung cancer progression.

 

 

Switching gears for a session on risk stratification, we heard from Ling Yang (Nuffield Department of Population Health) on chronic pathogen infections and the risk of cancer and Andres Tamm (Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences) on FIT for colorectal cancer risk stratification.

Taking us into the lunch break, we had two lightning talks by OxCODE Funding Scheme recipients James Chettle (Department of Oncology) on the RNA binding protein LARP1 as a driver of tumorigenesis and Natalie Jooss (MRC Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine) on the role of galectin-1 in myeloproliferative neoplasms.

Our second panel discussion of the event focussed on how to get grant funding for cancer early detection and prevention research, with contributions from Françoise Howe (OxCODE), Talisia Quallo (Cancer Research UK), Janette Rawlinson (patient and public representative) and Florence Theberge (Medical Research Council). The audience were advised to engage with fund managers early, make sure their ideas matched the funders’ interests and to include patient and public members from the start.

Georgia Black speaking on the organisation of non-specific symptom cancer pathwaysGeorgia Black speaking on the organisation of non-specific symptom cancer pathwaysIn our last session, we heard about diagnosing cancers with non-specific symptoms in Oxford’s SCAN pathway from Fergus Gleeson (Department of Oncology) and Claire Friedemann Smith (Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences) and barriers to research participation in the SCAN biobank from Julie-Ann Moreland (Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust) and Aduke Onofowokan (Inclusivitii). We were also privileged to have Georgia Black (Queen Mary’s University London) give the final keynote of the OxCODE symposium on the organisation of non-specific symptom cancer pathways.

 

We thank all the speakers, chairs and attendees for their contributions towards a highly successful meeting and look forward to next year’s event!

 

OxCODE welcomes members from across the University of Oxford and Oxford University Hospitals Trust. If you wish to join the OxCODE mailing list to hear about future events and funding opportunities, please email francoise.howe@ludwig.ox.ac.uk

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