Reflections from AACR 2024

I was in San Diego earlier this month at the American Association for Cancer Research conference. The theme of this year’s event – Inspiring Science, Fuelling Progress, Revolutionising Care – shone through in many of the sessions, including the incredible rate of progress and cutting-edge approaches, something that Cancer Research UK (CRUK) has at the heart of its long-term strategy. With over 22,000 participants, the breadth of topics covered over the six days was vast, but here are a few snippets of sessions that stood out to me.?

CRUK and CRH funded researchers?

The conference is a great place to catch up with our global partners, but I made sure that I carved out a couple of afternoons to hear the science first hand. Cancer Research UK Science and Innovation and Cancer Research Horizons funded researchers delivered dozens of impactful poster presentations at AACR this year. I enjoyed hearing from Jean Abraham of CRUK’s Cambridge Centre, who presented results for the Triple Negative Breast Cancer cohort in the PARTNER trial. The trial looked at testing Olaparib with chemotherapy prior to surgery and findings, published in Nature, showed that thousands of patients with breast cancer and advanced prostate cancer could benefit from the targeted therapy. The news has clear line-of-sight to patient impact and is a step closer to precision cancer treatment.?

Another of our researchers in Cambridge, Rebecca Fitzgerald , shared insights about the evolutionary trajectories of Barrett’s to intercept oesophageal cancer. She highlighted the transformational BEST4 trial, co-funded by CRUK and the NIHR (National Institute for Health and Care Research) , that is developing evidence for a national screening programme to treat the disease. As well as her work on the BEST4 trial, Professor Fitzgerald is also part of the eDyNAmiC Cancer Grand Challenges team seeking to gain new insights into extrachromosomal DNA (ecDNA). One of her eDyNAmiC teammates, Ben Cravatt , presented at the inaugural plenary session at AACR, talking us through Activity-Based Proteomics – a technique he uses to find cancer targets and ligands to bring to bear on them. This is an interesting approach as it allows insight into an enzyme's activity, not just it’s abundance – useful because it is this which ultimately dictates its role in cell physiology and, importantly for cancer research, pathology.?

There was a masterclass on how to take people on a journey with a scientific presentation from the University of Dundee’s Adrian Saurin too. He explored the implications of cell overgrowth that can happen, counterintuitively, due to some oncogenic signals. In effect, Dr Saurin’s research outlined how oncogenic signals can prime cancer cells for toxic cell overgrowth during a specific moment in cell cycle called ‘GI’.???

AI in cancer research?

One topic common across several high-profile sessions was the utilisation of AI technologies in cancer research. It’s something that is clearly front-of-mind for many researchers and we are already seeing some very exciting advances. The pace of AI technological changes in recent years has been substantial, but like many things, decades of hard work were required to get to this stage. During another impactful talk, the University of Chicago’s Maryellen Giger showed her first system of a prototype computer-aided diagnosis system from – wait for it – 1994. ??

Another session on AI that stood out was from CRUK-funded researcher, Mireia Crispin , who presented great work utilising AI to incorporate huge amounts of multiomic data to make models of cancer. Following her session, Dr Crispin was asked about whether a full understanding of what an AI does is required to generate a model. Her response was, I think, very interesting – she suggested that it isn’t. The important thing though is to robustly validate models which utilise AI – it is this which can generate the trust needed in the model. As things stand, the scientific community is on the cusp of beginning that validation journey for many of the AI approaches to generating models.?

Cancer vaccines?

Another area that provoked plenty of discussion was the development of cancer vaccines. Unsurprisingly, the topic has had a lot of buzz surround it in the past few years, and it’s gaining momentum. We heard of exciting results from clinical trials and it’s encouraging that the research community is learning so much from them. One thing that is clear from the research so far is that it’s probably wise to avoid any notion of cancer vaccines as a magic bullet, with much of the work presented at AACR looking at their role as an additional immunological tool that can be used in combination with other approaches.??

It's an area that CRUK has great interest in, and last month we announced a joint investment with the CRIS Cancer Foundation into a potential world first – a vaccine to prevent lung cancer. The team will use technology similar to the successful Oxford/AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, aiming to develop a novel vaccine by targeting hotspot neoantigens via the ChAdOx platform.??

As well as listening to the latest science, AACR also provides an excellent opportunity to engage with our wonderful network of partners – many of whom also presented sessions of their own – and it was great to catch up with many of them during the trip. There’s too many individuals and organisations to cover here, but each of our likeminded partners plays a crucial role in helping make the greatest progress that we can together.??

Many remaining research questions around cancer are so complex and challenging that creating effective partnerships really is the best chance we have of answering them and improving the lives of cancer patients.??

You can’t help but come away from this conference feeling inspired by the sheer weight of intellectual power being applied to the cancer problem and a real sense of optimism about the future. Lots more to do, but every hope we will get there.????