UMBI SECURES AN INTERNATIONAL FUND FOR RESEARCH IN COLORECTAL CANCER WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF NEWCASTLE, UK

UMBI has achieved another milestone in obtaining international research funding. UMBI researchers Professor Datuk Dr. A Rahman A Jamal and Dr. Nurul Syakima Ab Mutalib, together with Dr. Jeyanthy Eswaran from Newcastle University, have successfully secured a Medical Research Council Confidence In Concept (CiC) Funding under the Global Challenges Newcastle Award (GCNA). Awards under the GCNA are intended to accelerate the transition from discovery research to clinical applications by supporting preliminary work or feasibility studies to establish the viability of a larger-scale project. For this exciting project, UMBI will focus on the prevalence of microsatellite instability (MSI) in colorectal cancer patients.

MSI is a pattern of hypermutation that occurs at genomic microsatellites and is caused by defects in the mismatch repair system in several types of human cancer, most frequently in colorectal, endometrial, and gastric cancers. MSI is known to be both predictive and prognostic, especially in colorectal and endometrial cancers.

The proposed research will have an impact on the management of colorectal cancer patients and the detection of individuals who might require early cancer screening due to familial or other genetic risks. If this cost effective comprehensive genetic test is developed on an automated high throughput platform it will certainly revolutionise the way the colorectal patients are managed in future. In addition to the identification of individuals at risk for Lynch Syndrome (the familial type of colorectal cancers), this project will target the stratification for the emerging immunotherapy treatment in colorectal cancers. Together, this assay will provide a major shift in colorectal cancer patient management and Lynch syndrome detection in our country. This grant value is 92,000 GBP and will be shared amongst the collaborating institutions (RM 488,590.04). Congratulations!