Prostate Cancer
Enhancing our knowledge of the pathogenesis of prostate cancer and translating it into novel diagnostic methods and therapeutic strategies.
Leader: Carlos Cordon-Cardo, MD, PhD
Co-Leader: Daniel Petrylak, MD
This program aims to explore how prostate cancer begins so that individual patients can be treated effectively, and to clarify the complex array of distinct diseases called prostate cancer. The multi-disciplinary team includes basic, translational and clinical scientists, with expertise in molecular and experimental pathology, mouse genetics and modeling, genomics and informatics, as well as clinical trial design and population-based studies. The disease-centered, mechanism-based focus helps to transfer biological discoveries into animal models, preclinical and clinical applications. Clinical applications include novel assays to diagnose cancer and predict its progress, use of molecular signals to guide trials, and a plan that continually adapts experimental treatment to a patient's changing condition.
Major Themes
The members of the program come from one basic science department and five clinical departments. Their activities are organized around three themes:
- Pathophysiology and molecular oncology – identifying tumor suppressors and oncogenes involved in the initiation and progression of prostate cancer, further defining molecular disease stages
- Generation of cancer models – using laboratory models to guide preclinical searches for biomarkers of tumor progression, mechanisms of resistance, and biological endpoints
- Experimental therapeutics – optimizing clinical trials guided by molecular determinants, and implementing decision-making tools that aid in clinical management