The Francis Crick Institute
The Francis Crick Institute is Europe's largest biomedical research institute, home of the TRACERx tumour evolution studies (Swanton).
TRACERx (lung cancer evolution, ctDNA), cancer evolution (Swanton), immune surveillance; partnership with CRUK, UCL, Imperial, King's.
- TRACERx tumour evolution
- ctDNA biology
Immunologist who works out how dendritic cells detect dying tumour cells and start an anti-cancer response.
Leads TRACERx, the study that follows lung cancers as they evolve, and showed how air pollution can trigger lung cancer without new mutations.
Cell biologist studying how the tumour's surroundings help cancer cells invade and resist drugs.
Nobel laureate who discovered how cyclin-dependent kinases control cell division, and founding director of the Crick.
Relapse after surgery is driven by particular subclones that can be identified in the primary tumour and tracked in blood, which argues for evolution-aware adjuvant strategies. The pollution finding reframes carcinogenesis: some agents promote already-mutant cells rather than causing mutations.
Lung cancers keep evolving after they form, and it is ongoing chromosomal instability rather than the number of mutations that best predicts who will relapse. This gives a rationale for targeting the earliest (clonal) drivers and neoantigens and for tracking evolution in blood after surgery.
A single biopsy is an incomplete picture of a patient's cancer. Truncal mutations shared by all cells (in kidney cancer, VHL) are the most reliable drug targets, whereas mutations in only some branches predict resistance. This is why liquid biopsy and multi-region sampling matter.
Pages like this
not linked directly; found by shared links- InstitutionCancer Research UK
Shares Pool every multi-sample tumour genome into one open evolution atlas, A national rapid research autopsy network for end-stage cancer, The Mark Foundation for Cancer Research, Bank three spatially separate tumour blocks from every resection.
- TermWhole-genome doubling (WGD)
Shares Is aneuploidy itself a druggable vulnerability?, TRACERx 421: the full-cohort picture of how lung cancer evolves and which subclones drive relapse, TRACERx first 100: tracking how lung cancers evolve, and how chromosomal chaos predicts relapse, Chromosomal instability & aneuploidy.
- IdeaAttack extrachromosomal DNA, the engine of oncogene amplification
Shares Chromosomal instability & aneuploidy, DNA replication stress, Clonal evolution & minimal residual disease, Whole-exome & whole-genome sequencing.
- Key paperMartincorena: normal sun-exposed skin is a patchwork of cancer-mutation clones
Shares Intercept cancer at the field stage, Field cancerisation, Clonal evolution & minimal residual disease, Whole-exome & whole-genome sequencing.
- TermMutational signature
Shares Wellcome, Cancer Grand Challenges, Chromosomal instability & aneuploidy, Clonal evolution & minimal residual disease.
- IdeaA clone report from blood at every treatment cycle
Shares Gerlinger: a single biopsy misses most of the mutations in a kidney tumour, Tumour heterogeneity and clonal evolution, Liquid biopsy (ctDNA), Non-small-cell lung cancer.
- TermCirculating tumour DNA (ctDNA)
Shares Charles Swanton, Cancer Research UK Manchester Institute, University College London Hospitals / UCL Cancer Institute, TRACERx 421: the full-cohort picture of how lung cancer evolves and which subclones drive relapse.
- TermVariant allele frequency (VAF)
Shares Gerlinger: a single biopsy misses most of the mutations in a kidney tumour, Clonal evolution & minimal residual disease, Tumour heterogeneity and clonal evolution, Liquid biopsy (ctDNA).