Resolutely focused on the objective of defeating the crab, Gustave Roussy, the first cancer center in Europe, focuses on precision medicine, from prevention to post-cancer. And among the challenges that the institute wishes to take on, Gustave Roussy wishes to tackle cancer in young adults (20-40 years old) and become a center of international appeal. These are the objectives that the institute presented at a press conference ahead of World Cancer Day.
A strategy which will take place in a 500 million euro campus transformation project on their current site in Villejuif. “We want to have a link where care, research and economic development will be brought together”comments Professor Fabrice Barlesi, general director of Gustave Roussy. “ Thanks to the future research building, which should be delivered at the end of 2027, researchers from all disciplines will be able to exchange easily with each other with access to technological platforms. We have the ambition to be able to carry out phase 2 trials within our walls! »
Cancers in young adults: research is accelerating
Cancers in young adults increased by 79% between 1990 and 2019 worldwide, according to a study published in The BMJ Oncology. “While there are figures at the global level, it is more complicated to understand, in France, the extent of this increase. But data from Globocan already reports, between 1998 and 2017, an increase among young people in breast cancers (+1.7%), digestive cancers (+5.4% for colorectal cancer and +4. 3% for pancreatic cancer) and lung cancers, particularly in women. In France, in 2022, 15,000 cases of cancer in young adults have been recorded. specifies Professor Barlesi.
“To tackle cancers in young adults, we aim to understand their causes and specificities, accelerate early diagnosis, develop new treatments and optimize the patient’s care pathway. after cancer”, explains in turn Professor Fabrice André, director of research at Gustave Roussy. Thus, in recent years, the institute has developed several research programs dedicated to these cancers brought together under the initiative “Cancer at 30 – Power for YA”. Let us cite the Yoda cohort which is interested in digestive cancers in young subjects, or other projects on early diagnosis and prognosis, such as Fresh (liquid biopsy in around thirty French centers), Interception (prevention and detection intended for people at risk, available at the regional level in around ten centers) or even Age-Protect TNBC (prediction of the risk of triple negative breast cancer, increasingly found in young women).
“Whether for young adults or not, it is essential to catch these cancers as early as possible and to have tools to characterize them, stratify the risk and best predict the response to treatment. We also need to develop personalized treatments,” adds the research director. “It seems realistic to us to be able to cure 80% of patients by 2040 thanks to the acceleration of technological and therapeutic progress. Today, 450,000 new cases of cancer are diagnosed each year in France, and two out of three patients are cured, compared to one in two in the 1990s.continues Professor Fabrice Barlesi. To do this, the institute relies on precision medicine to which the IHU Prism, labeled “National Center for Precision Medicine in Oncology”, is dedicated. “The research carried out in the Prism program integrates artificial intelligence and the exploitation of digital twins”specifies Professor André.
-“We also have cutting-edge technologies, such as vectorized internal radiotherapy which targets cancer cells directly and which is particularly interesting in prostate cancer, Flash radiotherapy which delivers ultra-high doses in a fraction of a second or even the robot Single-Port we are receiving next week »explains Professor Barlesi. “We are also focusing on cell therapies such as TILs (tumor infiltrating lymphocytes, editor’s note) and CAR-T cells with programs such as MTI-exp or Ice, and we will continue to develop our expertise in conjugated antibodies.”
A race for technology transfer
Just like many other institutes and research centers, Gustave Roussy wishes to strengthen technology transfer with its subsidiary Gustave Roussy Transfert. A strategy materialized by the construction of buildings dedicated to “economic valorization” as part of the campus transformation project.
Today, the cancer institute is behind 563 clinical studies, 84% of which are therapeutic trials, with more than 5,600 of their patients included. “ All this also responds to a desire to recruit French and international talents and to be competitive at the international level.continues Sylvain Ducroz, deputy director of Gustave Roussy. In 2025, we will launch a new philanthropy campaign worth 100 million euros to finance campus work, recruitment, research and equipment.”
