Novel molecular diagnostic tools for the prevention and diagnosis of pancreatic cancer (MOLDIAG-PACA)

Basic data for this project

Description

Malignant tumours of the pancreas, known as pancreatic carcinomas, remain among the most serious challenges in modern medicine. Although not among the most common tumours, they are among the most frequent causes of cancer-related deaths, with approximately 28,000 deaths per year in the USA (3) and 40,000 per year in Europe (13). There are currently no means for the reliable diagnosis of early stages and for curative treatment of late stages of the tumour.The overall aim of this EU Framework Programme 6 Integrated Project is to make use of genetic profiles of pancreatic cancer and precursor lesions to improve the outcome of pancreatic cancer patients by providing novel and highly efficient molecular diagnostic tools. One of the major prerequisites in order to achieve this ambitious aim is an integrated multidisciplinary research approach, which enables a strong interaction between technology, biology and medicine to translate genome data into practical, clinical applications.EU funding for the consortium was started Aug 2006 for three years, bringing together 19 European partners from academia and industry with long-standing interest in pancreatic cancer biology, diagnosis and treatment. Since the express goal of this consortium is to generate molecular diagnostic tools that will be ready for clinical applications in the course of the project, inclusion of Small and Medium sized Enterprises (SME) with a particular interest in developing molecular diagnostic tools was a special priority from the beginning.