Stand Up To Cancer® (SU2C) and Cancer Research UK have announced new support for a dream team focused on stopping gastric cancer in its earliest stages.
The extended funding for the SU2C Gastric Cancer Interception Dream Team will allow this leading group of researchers to build on the success of their earlier SU2C-funded studies, including launching a clinical trial that will test a novel way of making early gastric tumours much easier to identify during endoscopy procedures.
The potential impact of this research is vast. Worldwide, gastric cancer is the fifth most common type of cancer and third leading cause of cancer-related death, claiming more than 750,000 lives each year. By 2040, the number of people diagnosed with gastric cancer is expected to increase by more than 60 per cent, to nearly 1.8 million diagnoses each year.
Initially formed in 2020, this Stand Up To Cancer dream team includes leading institutions in the US, UK, and South Korea, reflecting a truly global effort to improve early detection of gastric cancer. For its next phase, the team will receive an additional $3 million in funding. The research is backed by Stand Up To Cancer and Cancer Research UK as part of their longstanding strategic partnership. In the UK, Cancer Research UK raises funds under its Stand Up To Cancer campaign to advance collaborative international research.
This next chapter of the team’s work is also made possible thanks to the generosity of the Cless Family Foundation, the Sara Schottenstein Foundation, Swim for Sara, and the Torrey Coast Foundation. The team will further benefit from a commitment of technology and services from Lumicell, Inc.
“The extension of this team’s funding reflects the extraordinary progress they’ve made in shifting our organizations’ approach to gastric cancer — from focusing on treatment to focusing on true interception,” said Julian Adams, PhD, president and CEO of Stand Up To Cancer. “Their work exemplifies SU2C’s mission to drive bold, collaborative research that reaches people as early as possible in their cancer journey and saves lives. We’re proud to continue supporting this team as they move critical early-stage detection strategies closer to clinical use.”
“Finding new ways to detect cancer earlier is key to bringing about a world where people live longer, better lives, free from the fear of cancer,” said Talisia Quallo, PhD, head of prevention and early detection at Cancer Research UK. “We’re pleased to support the dream team’s efforts in developing technologies and strategies to detect gastric cancer at earlier stages, with a focus on higher-risk patient populations. It is exciting that some of the developed tools can now be tested in a clinical trial, and we look forward to seeing how this work progresses.”
Led by Andrew Chan, MD, MPH, chief of the Clinical and Translational Epidemiology Unit and a gastroenterologist at the Mass General Brigham Cancer Institute, the team’s initial SU2C-funded research tested new imaging tools and identified promising early warning signs of gastric cancer.
“This funding extension is not just about continuing great science. It’s about fundamentally changing how we detect and stop gastric cancer,” said Dr Chan. “We’re entering a critical moment where precision tools for early detection are becoming real options for patients. By focusing on developing minimally invasive methods for identifying tumors in their earliest, least lethal forms, we have a chance to shift outcomes dramatically while also creating a model for intercepting other cancers as well.”
This international effort focuses on people with higher risk of gastric cancer, including those who live in Asia and Latin America, where the disease is more prevalent. The research will also include a special focus on people who have inherited genetic changes—including those in the CDH1 gene — that significantly increase their chances of developing diffuse gastric cancer, an aggressive subtype of the disease.
The team’s goal is to detect and even stop gastric cancer before it starts, addressing a major gap in care: Many people are not diagnosed until the disease has already advanced, when the 5-year survival rate drops to just six per cent.
Building on a track record of innovation
Previous research by this team united leading scientists and clinicians in a groundbreaking collaboration. Together, they built the largest centralized global biobank of blood, tissue, and stool samples from individuals with early-stage gastric cancer or precancerous lesions to fuel ongoing research and collaboration.
The team has also developed advanced lab models of gastric cancer to identify early signals in blood and stool, including links between gut bacteria and cancer risk, and tested imaging tools to highlight tumours in real time during procedures.
With this extended funding, the team will:
- Initiate a clinical trial using fluorescence-guided endoscopy (pFGE), an imaging platform developed with Lumicell that uses a fluorescent optical imaging agent, a specialised near-infrared flexible probe, and real-time software to help doctors spot gastric tumours more sensitively and clearly during endoscopy procedures.
- Refine and validate a blood biomarker called ORF1p, which appears in more than 95 per cent of stomach and oesophageal cancers, to support earlier detection and treatment.
- Expand research on stool-based biomarkers and the gut microbiome to better understand which biological signals point to early disease and identify people at the highest risk of this cancer.
For the first time, these technologies will potentially make it possible to identify gastric cancer earlier, when it is more treatable.
Beyond gastric cancer: a path for other cancers
While the team’s primary focus is gastric cancer, the technologies being developed — especially blood-based biomarkers and molecular imaging — may also help detect other digestive tract cancers, including oesophageal, colon and pancreatic cancers. Some tools could even apply to lung cancer detection in the future.
Pictured: Andrew Chan, MD, MPH, chief of the Clinical and Translational Epidemiology Unit and a gastroenterologist at the Mass General Brigham Cancer Institute
