Researchers from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) today announced the launch of a three-year, $100-million pilot program for the Human Cancer Genome Project (HCGP).

Highlighted by the landmark completion of the Human Genome Project (HGP) 30 months ago, researchers have completed the genome catalogs of more than 300 organisms, including this year first drafts of the dog and chimpanzee genomes.

But the complete inventory of human genes does not by itself provide a huge advance in scientists’ understanding of the molecular biology of cancer. Many senior U.S. researchers have publicly posited launching a more ambitious cancer genome project. Part of the rationale is the medical necessity – one American dies of cancer every 60 seconds. One in two American men and one in three women will die of cancer.

Earlier this year, Broad Institute director Eric Lander floated the idea of a nine-year, $1.3-billion HCGP, backed by former NIH director Harold Varmus and others. Lander suggested surveying 250 genome samples from each of 250 tumor types, producing a comprehensive catalogue of cancer-causing mutations.

This would be a much more ambitious project than ongoing projects to sample the range of mutations in cancer-associated genes, such as the cancer genome anatomy project , which is led by Michael Stratton at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in Cambridge, England.

The Cancer Genome Atlas
In a press conference at the National Press Club in Washington D.C., NHGRI director Francis Collins noted that the first call for the HGP, in 1986, was made by a cancer biologist, Renato Dulbecco. But while “more than 300 genes contribute to the diabolical transformation of normal cells into cancer cells,” a complete inventory of the genetic aberrations in cancer was urgently needed.

Collins said the unique collaboration between the NCI and the NHGRI would “go beyond and behind the frontlines to create the first list of genomic insurgents that lead to cancer.” The project will be called The Cancer Genome Atlas – TCGA for short. The abbreviation, made up of the four letters of the genetic code, was no accident said Collins.

Collins said the TCGA pilot project would unite the “powerful resources and experience of the [NCI], with the genome attitude of the [NHGRI]… Together, we’ve committed to investing $100 million over the next three years to construct a powerful network of researchers, technology and resources to tackle the cancer problem like never before.”

“This is an audacious project,” said Collins. “We could not have undertaken this project until now. The biomedical research projects are aligned, the time is right.”

Andrew Von Eschenbach, director of the NCI, said the TCGA pilot project would help make cancer a chronic manageable condition. “Mapping the cancer genome will be … an important step in the understanding of the genetic component of the cancer process and the genetic susceptibility of people who are threatened by cancer.”

Project leaders said that all the data would be deposited in the public domain. The glut of data that will emerge will be managed by the NIH Center for Bioinformatics and the NCI's cancer Biomedical Informatics Grid (caBIG). Much of the funding will go towards identifying better technologies, as well as encouraging the small business community through SBIR programs.

The first tumor types to be studied will be selected in the next few months. Milestones will be set along the way to determine whether the project should be scaled up.

Not all cancer researchers support the idea of the HCGP. Two distinguished cancer biologists, Steve Elledge and Greg Hannon, recently criticized the project on the grounds that it would fail to meet its goals, and siphon money away from more fruitful investigator-driven research. Similar objections to the HGP were raised two decades ago.

Those complaints were rebutted by Nobel laureate Harold Varmus and Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory director Bruce Stillman. “The cancer research community now needs a much better description of the genetic damage that drives human cancers,” Varmus and Stillman wrote in a letter to Science last week. “This will form the basis for all future studies of cancer in the laboratory and the clinic and will provide immediate benefit for molecular diagnosis of human cancers.”

Collins acknowledged that there has been some anxiety about the total cost of the TCGA. “We have no idea” of the ultimate cost, he admitted, adding that lessons learned in the coming three years will determine the cost of expanding the project from 2-3 tumors to 50 or more. “Having a pilot project is a strong inspiration for the development of new technologies and the optimization of existing ones,” said Collins.

NIH Director Elias Zerhouni added that major initiatives such as TCGA are “not designed to consume money but to provide new opportunities, new hypotheses that researchers will use. Even in tight budget times, we intend to make sure that balance [with investigator-driven funding] is preserved.”