The Oregon Cancer Center (OCC), a matrix Clinical Cancer Center at Oregon Health Science University (OHSU) with 173 members, was awarded a CCSG (P30) two years ago. Since that time, the Center has been assigned 33,000 square feet of new space for its headquarters (11,000 square feet) and a new basic research building (22,000 square feet). Having focused on strengthening our clinical research infrastructure, we have successfully recruited senior leaders in clinical cancer research, two of whom are now principal investigators of multi- institutional study groups and serve on the Leadership Council of the Center. In the past two years of CCSG support, our investigators- institutional therapeutic clinical trials have increased fourfold, we are now ranked fourth in accruals to SWOG studies, and we have tripled CCG accruals. Our experimental Therapeutics program has focused directly on transplantation and cancer immunology, in part responding to criticisms in the prior review and input from the external advisory team. Now known is the Transplantation/Immunology Program, this group focuses on immunological tolerance in transplantation and cancer immunology. Because of the cohesiveness of this smaller, more focused group this program has the highest frequency of inter- and intra-programmatic publications in our Center. In cancer control, we have recruited seasoned investigators to the Center and have reached a critical mass in four focus areas driving support of this program's investigator-initiated research portfolio from $300,000 annually to more than $5 million annually in two years. In the past three years we have recruited 42 new members, and, in the next five years, we will recruit no fewer than 27 more in collaboration with 10 departments and institutes. The mission of our Center is to support research designed to identify molecular defects in neoplastic cells and to exploit such knowledge to develop more effective strategies for diagnosis, treatment, prevention, and control of malignant diseases. Translational research projects have increased in all five of the programs, and. in the past two years, some of our best scientific research projects have already moved into Phase I clinical trials.
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