Thanks to you, we’re getting closer every day to a world without cancer. In 2022 alone, thanks to your wonderful support, we were honoured to officially open six world-class cancer research projects across Australia – and to kickstart yet more brilliant, pioneering research.
Fiona was just 49, a widow with three young children, when her dreams came crashing down. She was diagnosed with kidney cancer and had to face the devastating possibility that she’d never see her children grow up.
Thankfully cancer research meant she was provided with new treatment options to successfully manage her cancer. In fact, she has just celebrated the first of her children’s wedding – a once-in-a-lifetime moment she never dreamed she would live to see.
The ACRF Program for Resolving Cancer Complexity and Therapeutic Resistance officially opened at WEHI in March 2022.
This facility is enabling researchers to investigate why some people develop resistance to cancer treatment, and how to prevent this response.
Researchers are gaining a deeper understanding of how cancers develop at a single-cell level, so they can find better ways to personalise cancer therapies and save more lives.
The ACRF Centre for Intravital Imaging of Niches for Cancer Immune Therapy officially opened at Garvan Institute of Medical Research in June 2022, with the goal of unlocking the enormous life-saving potential of this pioneering treatment.
Whilst immunotherapy holds great potential for many people, it is not yet an option for some common types of cancer. By looking in the ‘dark spaces’ deep inside tumours, this research aims to address why some patients have a remarkable response to cancer immunotherapies, while other patients do not respond.
In December 2022 we proudly announced the award of a $2.1 million grant to Olivia Newton-John Cancer Research Institute to establish a cutting-edge radiochemistry laboratory, the ACRF Centre for Precision Medicine.
At this world-class facility, researchers will use a new and exciting form of precision medicine, ‘theranostics’, which combines radioisotopes to diagnose and treat a tumour.
Bringing together scientific and patient-facing experts, this project will translate new treatments from the lab into the clinic more quickly – helping to control advanced cancers and enhance quality of life for people impacted by this devastating disease.
At just four years old, little Frankie was diagnosed with leukemia and only a day later, began chemotherapy treatment. She remained bright and sparkly throughout 2.5 years of gruelling treatment – and recently took her last chemotherapy tablet.
Little Frankie is now in remission! These days, she is out riding her fluoro green bike in the sun without a care in the world.
And because you choose to back brilliant research, more families like Frankie’s can now look forward to living cancer-free.
The ACRF International Centre for Cancer Glycomics officially opened at Griffith University in August 2022. This unique hub of revolutionary research has enabled a diverse and multi-disciplinary team to come together and collaborate on deciphering the cancer glyco-code – which plays a major role in a tumour’s development, progression, and susceptibility to immunotherapy.
This research could lead to the invention of new drugs, vaccines, and diagnostics to treat, prevent, or diagnose significant cancers such as skin, ovarian and breast.
The ACRF Child Cancer Liquid Biopsy Program, which officially opened at Children’s Cancer Institute in May 2022, is set to help more than 1,000 children and young people diagnosed with cancer each year in Australia.
Instead of diagnosing a child’s tumour through repeated surgical biopsies, researchers are harnessing the latest technologies to develop more sensitive and less invasive types of sampling – so clinicians can monitor the child’s treatment response and deliver the right treatment, to the right child, at the right time.
