Torchlight on cancer collaboration

The Peter MacCallum Pfizer Translational Oncology Research Collaborative Hub (TORCH) has received funding of $15 million over three years from pharmaceutical company Pfizer.

The collaboration will integrate three activities - molecular imaging, cancer genomics and high quality clinical trial capabilities. The ultimate aim will be new and improved treatments for cancer patients.

Peter Mac CEO Craig Bennett said the development of new cancer treatments had undergone a dramatic change.

"The emphasis of research has shifted towards personalising medicine - using information and data from a patient's genotype to tailor drugs specifically to a patient's genetic profile," Bennett said.

"This is designed to work far more efficiently and has the potential to reduce side effects - a ground breaking concept in the treatment of cancer."

The launch of TORCH marks a significant expansion of the relationship between Pfizer Australia and Peter Mac. In the last year alone, the two organisations have collaborated on numerous pre-clinical programs and three Phase I clinical trials, with a fourth to commence later this year.

The new collaboration expands on the existing Pfizer program which combines PET imaging to measure blood flow, oxygen use, and sugar metabolism to detect cancer in the body with biomarkers used to predict which patients will benefit most from new cancer treatments.

"This translational research facility will help satisfy Pfizer's pre-clinical oncology imaging needs, create a dedicated genomics facility for the development of predictive markers of response to novel cancer therapeutics and secure dedicated clinical trials capabilities," Pfizer Australia's head of strategic alliances, Dr Daniel Grant, said.

"The existing collaboration with the Peter MacCallum is one of the best examples of a truly translational oncology alliance in Australia - where the same investigators who are involved in our preclinical research take the lead in our clinical trials with the same compounds and effectively interact with our discovery and clinical teams."