Douglas Hanahan: The daunting complexity of cancer: understanding the battlefield is a step towards winning the war

<!--HTML--><p><span style="font-size:14px">The Inaugural Grace-CERN Lecture</span></p> <p><span style="color:rgb(0, 0, 255)"><span style="font-size:14px">The daunting complexity of cancer: understanding the battlefield is a step towards winning the war&nbsp;</span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:14px"><span style="font-size:14px"><img alt="" src="https://indico.cern.ch/event/343539/picture/1.jpg" style="height:125px; width:100px" /></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:14px">Douglas Hanahan, Ph.D.</span></p> <p><span style="font-size:10px">Director, Swiss Institute for Experimental Cancer Research (ISREC)</span></p> <p><span style="font-size:10px">&nbsp;Professor of Molecular Oncology, School of Life Sciences,</span></p> <p><span style="font-size:10px">Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL)</span></p> <p><span style="font-size:10px">Vice Director, Swiss Cancer Center Lausanne</span></p> <p>Synopsis (version francaise ci-dessous)</p> <p style="text-align: justify;">Cancer is a disease&nbsp;with hundreds of variations, both&nbsp;in affected organs and in responses to different therapies. &nbsp;Modern human cancer research is producing an avalanche of data about the distinctive genetic aberrations of its specific types, further accentuating the diversity and vast complexity of the disease. There is hope that elucidating its mechanisms will lead to more informed and more effective therapeutic strategies. &nbsp;Understanding the enemy is paramount, and yet tumors arising in different organs can be so different as to defy their integration into an informed vision. &nbsp;Are there common principles underlying this daunting complexity? &nbsp;One hypothesis, to be discussed, is that most symptomatic forms of human cancer necessarily acquire a similar set of capabilities. &nbsp;The proposition is that appreciation of these so-called <em>hallmarks of cancer</em> can help integrate its complexity into a clearer understanding of the battlefields of cancer. This over-arching battle space perspective may lead to new therapeutic strategies aimed at multi-targeting the <em>hallmarks of cancer</em>.</p> <p style="text-align: justify;">Le s&eacute;minaire est en anglais avec interpr&eacute;tation simultan&eacute;e en fran&ccedil;ais</p> <p><span style="font-size:14px"><span style="font-size:14px"><img alt="" src="https://indico.cern.ch/event/343539/picture/1.jpg" style="height:125px; width:100px" /></span></span></p> <p><span style="color:rgb(0, 0, 205)">La complexit&eacute; d&eacute;concertante du cancer:</span></p> <p><span style="color:rgb(0, 0, 205)">Comprendre les r&egrave;gles du champ de bataille est d&eacute;j&agrave; un pas vers la victoire</span></p> <p><span style="font-size:10px">Douglas Hanahan, Ph.D.</span></p> <p><span style="font-size:10px">Directeur Centre Suisse de la Recherche Experimentale sur le cancer (ISREC)</span></p> <p><span style="font-size:10px">Professeur en oncologie mol&eacute;culaire, Ecole des Sciences du Vivant,</span></p> <p><span style="font-size:10px">Ecole Polytechnique F&eacute;d&eacute;rale de Lausanne (EPFL)</span></p> <p><span style="font-size:10px">Vice Directeur du Centre Suisse sur le Cancer, Lausanne</span></p> <p style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;<span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif">Le cancer est une maladie qui se d&eacute;cline en centaines de variations possibles, touchant diff&eacute;rents organes et r&eacute;pondant tr&egrave;s diff&eacute;remment aux diff&eacute;rentes formes de traitement. La recherche moderne sur le cancer de l&acute;homme produit quantit&eacute;s de nouvelles donn&eacute;es sur ses alt&eacute;rations g&eacute;n&eacute;tiques, soulignant d&#39;avantage encore sa diversit&eacute; et sa complexit&eacute;. L&#39;&eacute;lucidation de ces m&eacute;canismes permettent d&#39;esp&eacute;rer que soient d&eacute;velopp&eacute;es de nouvelles strat&eacute;gies th&eacute;rapeutiques plus efficaces. Comprendre l&#39;ennemi devient primordial, cependant les tumeurs se d&eacute;veloppant dans les diff&eacute;rents organes peuvent &ecirc;tre si diff&eacute;rentes qu&#39;elles mettent en question l&#39;id&eacute;e m&ecirc;me de leur int&eacute;gration en une vision globale. Y a-t-il des principes communs sous-jacents &agrave; cette complexit&eacute; d&eacute;concertante ? Une hypoth&agrave;se, &agrave; discuter ici, est que la plupart des formes du cancer chez l&#39;homme doit n&eacute;cessairement acqu&eacute;rir un ensemble donn&eacute; d&#39;aptitudes pour pr&eacute;senter les sympt&ocirc;mes de la maladie. Notre proposition est que la d&eacute;finition de ces <em>capacit&eacute;s distinctives du cancer</em> peuvent nous aider &agrave; appr&eacute;hender la complexit&eacute; des diff&eacute;rentes formes de cancers et leurs m&eacute;canismes g&eacute;n&eacute;tiques pour une meilleure compr&eacute;hension du champ de bataille. La d&eacute;finition de ce champ de bataille global peut conduire &agrave; de nouvelles strat&eacute;gies th&eacute;rapeutiques ayant pour but de cibler plusieurs des <em>capacit&eacute;s distinctives du cancer</em>.</span></p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p>