A large-scale study that defines the complexity of underlying mutations responsible for pancreatic cancers in more than 100 patients was published online in Nature on October 24, 2012. The analysis represents the first report from Australia’s contribution to the International Cancer Genome Consortium (ICGC), which brings together the world's leading scientists to identify the genetic drivers behind 50 different cancer types. Pancreatic cancer has the highest mortality rate of all the major cancers and is one of the few for which survival has not improved substantially over the past 40 years. It is the fourth-leading cause of cancer death. Professor Sean Grimmond, from the Institute for Molecular Bioscience (IMB) at The University of Queensland, and Professor Andrew Biankin, from The Kinghorn Cancer Centre at Sydney’s Garvan Institute of Medical Research / St. Vincent's Hospital, led an international team of more than 100 researchers that sequenced the genomes of 100 pancreatic tumors and compared them to normal tissue to determine the genetic changes that lead to this cancer. “We found over 2,000 mutated genes in total, ranging from the KRAS gene, which was mutated in about 90 per cent of samples, to hundreds of gene mutations that were only present in 1 or 2 per cent of tumors,” Professor Grimmond said. “So while tumors may look very similar under the microscope, genetic analysis reveals as many variations in each tumor as there are patients. This demonstrates that so-called ‘pancreatic cancer’ is not one disease, but many, and suggests that people who seemingly have the same cancer might need to be treated quite differently.” Professor Biankin said such individual genetic diagnoses and treatments represent the future of healthcare.Login Or Register To Read Full Story