sarcoma research
The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute, is dedicated to improving patient care and outcomes through research. Current sarcoma initiatives include:
- Testing new drugs aimed at slowing or halting the progress of sarcomas
- Finding ways to help the body’s immune system subdue sarcoma cancer cells
- Using advanced imaging to assess intraoperative margins
- Assessing the benefits of minimally invasive tumor treatments
- Exploring the origins of sarcoma at the genetic level
- Developing personalized treatment strategies with the latest sarcoma therapies
DR. JOAL BEANE
Recepient of 2020 Steps for Sarcoma Award and his work:
Immunotherapy has gained a significant amount of interest as curable treatment strategy for patients with cancer. Immunotherapies work by harnessing a patient’s own immune system to attack and kill tumor cells, thereby eradicating them from the body. T cell-based therapies are a type of immunotherapy that use a patient’s own T cells to target a specific protein on the surface of the cells in the tumor. By harvesting T cells from the patient’s tumor, expanding the cells to large numbers in the laboratory, and infusing the cells back into the host through an IV, the T cells can successfully target and kill tumor cells. While encouraging, this approach has only been more widely adopted for a few types of cancers. Our team is combining our experience in immune oncology with the experience of James’ Cell Therapy Lab to make T cell-based immunotherapies more available to patients with soft tissue sarcoma.
Recepient of 2020 Steps for Sarcoma Award and his work:
Immunotherapy has gained a significant amount of interest as curable treatment strategy for patients with cancer. Immunotherapies work by harnessing a patient’s own immune system to attack and kill tumor cells, thereby eradicating them from the body. T cell-based therapies are a type of immunotherapy that use a patient’s own T cells to target a specific protein on the surface of the cells in the tumor. By harvesting T cells from the patient’s tumor, expanding the cells to large numbers in the laboratory, and infusing the cells back into the host through an IV, the T cells can successfully target and kill tumor cells. While encouraging, this approach has only been more widely adopted for a few types of cancers. Our team is combining our experience in immune oncology with the experience of James’ Cell Therapy Lab to make T cell-based immunotherapies more available to patients with soft tissue sarcoma.
The James – OSUCCC Sarcoma Research
Because sarcoma is a rare disease, federal funding for sarcoma research is very difficult to obtain. One of the main reasons we began Steps for Sarcoma is to provide small grants of $15,000 to $30,000 to help young researchers produce preliminary or pilot data that support their research ideas and strengthen their chances of obtaining larger grants from the National Cancer Institute and other external sources.
We have used money raised by Steps for Sarcoma to help young researchers at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – James Cancer Hospital and Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James), the Ohio State College of Veterinary Medicine, and Nationwide Children's Hospital Research Institute produce pilot data that support studies involving:
These pilot projects have led to four national grants for our two medical oncologists:
In addition, we have funded multiple undergraduate and graduate summer research stipends at $5,000 per student for each summer. These grants help get students interested in sarcoma-research careers and assist Ohio State faculty researchers with ongoing projects.
During fiscal year 2016-17, we will provide $15,000 grants to fund undergraduate and graduate students at the OSUCCC – James, the Ohio State College of Veterinary Medicine, and Nationwide Children's Hospital Research Institute based on their competitive applications.
We also will be provide three $30,000 research grants for young sarcoma researchers within our program, including one grant for basic-science research, one for translational research (to assist with transitioning basic research to bedside practice), and one for clinical research that will directly improve patient care.
In addition, we will support a graduate student ($12,000/year) in Veterinary Medicine through our collaboration with the Oncology Signature Program in sarcoma research, and we will continue our support ($30,000/year) of a clinical research coordinator for the development of our multidisciplinary sarcoma tumor registry.
Your support for Steps for Sarcoma has helped us develop our nationally recognized sarcoma research program to levels not previously possible. Thank you for your generous past support, and please join us again this year so we can provide even more funding for studies that will help us someday end the challenges faced by those who are affected by sarcoma.
We have used money raised by Steps for Sarcoma to help young researchers at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – James Cancer Hospital and Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James), the Ohio State College of Veterinary Medicine, and Nationwide Children's Hospital Research Institute produce pilot data that support studies involving:
- New chemotherapeutic options for pediatric osteosarcoma ($15,000);
- New methods of radiation protection for bone that has been exposed during soft tissue sarcoma treatment ($15,000);
- New ways to create an integrated multidisciplinary sarcoma registry that uses the nationally prominent electronic medical record (EMR) systems ($30,000);
- Methods for using new genetic markers as treatment options ($20,000).
These pilot projects have led to four national grants for our two medical oncologists:
- James Chen, MD – $100,000 for “Predicting Doxorubicin Sensitivity in Dedifferentiated Liposarcoma”;
- James Chen, MD – $150,000 for “Personalized Cancer Treatment Using a Patient-Centered, Similarity-Based Algorithm in Sarcoma”;
- David Liebner, MD – $50,000 for “Predicting Chemotherapy Response in Sarcoma Using Molecular and Imaging Data Collected in a Digital Registry”;
- David Liebner, MD – $50,000 for “Pilot Development of an Electronic Health Record (EHR)-Based Comprehensive Bone and Soft Tissue Tumor Registry as a Platform for Translational Research in Sarcoma.”
In addition, we have funded multiple undergraduate and graduate summer research stipends at $5,000 per student for each summer. These grants help get students interested in sarcoma-research careers and assist Ohio State faculty researchers with ongoing projects.
During fiscal year 2016-17, we will provide $15,000 grants to fund undergraduate and graduate students at the OSUCCC – James, the Ohio State College of Veterinary Medicine, and Nationwide Children's Hospital Research Institute based on their competitive applications.
We also will be provide three $30,000 research grants for young sarcoma researchers within our program, including one grant for basic-science research, one for translational research (to assist with transitioning basic research to bedside practice), and one for clinical research that will directly improve patient care.
In addition, we will support a graduate student ($12,000/year) in Veterinary Medicine through our collaboration with the Oncology Signature Program in sarcoma research, and we will continue our support ($30,000/year) of a clinical research coordinator for the development of our multidisciplinary sarcoma tumor registry.
Your support for Steps for Sarcoma has helped us develop our nationally recognized sarcoma research program to levels not previously possible. Thank you for your generous past support, and please join us again this year so we can provide even more funding for studies that will help us someday end the challenges faced by those who are affected by sarcoma.
OSU Veterinary Medical College Research
The Ohio State University College of Veterinary Medicine, the Wexner Medical Center and Ohio State’s Comprehensive Cancer Center-James Cancer Hospital and Solove Research Institute have the distinct advantage of being located on the same campus and possess a multi-disciplinary research and clinical team that are on the cutting-edge of this research approach. New discoveries are continuously being made to achieve our vision of a cancer-free world!
Naturally occurring cancers in pet dogs and humans share many features, including appearance under the microscope, genetic abnormalities and response and eventual resistance to chemotherapy and radiation therapy. Furthermore, the large size of dogs and the ability to use many of the standard treatment approaches used in people make dogs with spontaneous cancer a more closely related model of the human disease than those that are created in mice. Given these similarities and advantages, studies evaluating new therapies in dogs with spontaneous cancer can often provide important information that helps to guide clinical trials in humans. Such studies are referred to as comparative clinical trials as they use knowledge gained in dog studies to help insure that human studies are more successful. One disease where this approach is being actively undertaken is osteosarcoma, a cancer of bone that occurs in both dogs and humans but is over 10 times more prevalent in dogs. It is now clear that dog and human osteosarcoma are very closely related: both get the disease in the long bones (legs and arms), both are at high risk for spread of the tumor, and both have very similar changes in genes that are abnormal in the tumor cells. Studies performed in dogs with this disease have helped to shape the use of surgery techniques to save legs in people with osteosarcoma. While the current chemotherapy treatments used to treat this disease have dramatically improved outcome, approximately 30-40% of affected people and over 90% of affected dogs still die from the spread of osteosarcoma. Researchers from Nationwide Children’s Hospital, OSU College of Medicine, OSU College of Pharmacy, and OSU College of Veterinary Medicine have partnered to study osteosarcoma and develop new therapies that will work to prevent spread of tumor and eventually treat the spread more effectively should it occur. This group was recently awarded a 10 million dollar Program Project Grant from the National Cancer Institute. Additionally, the OSU College of Veterinary Medicine is participating in a multicenter clinical trial effort in dogs with osteosarcoma led by the Comparative Oncology Trials Consortium at the NCI to assess novel therapies to treat metastasis (tumor spread). Data from this clinical trial will be used to guide the next study in children with osteosarcoma. Ultimately, the goal of performing comparative cancer studies is to change how novel treatments for sarcoma are developed and tested so that these improved approaches can be more successfully moved from the bench to the bedside, thereby impacting outcomes in both humans and animals.
Naturally occurring cancers in pet dogs and humans share many features, including appearance under the microscope, genetic abnormalities and response and eventual resistance to chemotherapy and radiation therapy. Furthermore, the large size of dogs and the ability to use many of the standard treatment approaches used in people make dogs with spontaneous cancer a more closely related model of the human disease than those that are created in mice. Given these similarities and advantages, studies evaluating new therapies in dogs with spontaneous cancer can often provide important information that helps to guide clinical trials in humans. Such studies are referred to as comparative clinical trials as they use knowledge gained in dog studies to help insure that human studies are more successful. One disease where this approach is being actively undertaken is osteosarcoma, a cancer of bone that occurs in both dogs and humans but is over 10 times more prevalent in dogs. It is now clear that dog and human osteosarcoma are very closely related: both get the disease in the long bones (legs and arms), both are at high risk for spread of the tumor, and both have very similar changes in genes that are abnormal in the tumor cells. Studies performed in dogs with this disease have helped to shape the use of surgery techniques to save legs in people with osteosarcoma. While the current chemotherapy treatments used to treat this disease have dramatically improved outcome, approximately 30-40% of affected people and over 90% of affected dogs still die from the spread of osteosarcoma. Researchers from Nationwide Children’s Hospital, OSU College of Medicine, OSU College of Pharmacy, and OSU College of Veterinary Medicine have partnered to study osteosarcoma and develop new therapies that will work to prevent spread of tumor and eventually treat the spread more effectively should it occur. This group was recently awarded a 10 million dollar Program Project Grant from the National Cancer Institute. Additionally, the OSU College of Veterinary Medicine is participating in a multicenter clinical trial effort in dogs with osteosarcoma led by the Comparative Oncology Trials Consortium at the NCI to assess novel therapies to treat metastasis (tumor spread). Data from this clinical trial will be used to guide the next study in children with osteosarcoma. Ultimately, the goal of performing comparative cancer studies is to change how novel treatments for sarcoma are developed and tested so that these improved approaches can be more successfully moved from the bench to the bedside, thereby impacting outcomes in both humans and animals.
