City of Hope has long recognized the changing roles of academic institutions and the private sector in therapeutics research and has developed infrastructure and expertise to support the types of collaborations envisioned in the AP4 RFA and seeks to expand and refine it's mission through the NCI's Public Private Partnership Center program. COH established its Center for Applied Technology Development (CATD) in 1998 to bring together the infrastructure needed for true 'bench-to-bedside"""""""" development of emerging technologies emerging from the laboratories of COH scientists, our academic colleagues, and our biopharmaceutical partners. Complementing the CATD, COH has invested significant institutional resources in developing nationally recognized bioinformatics and biostatistics groups and, as a designated National Comprehensive Cancer Center, a well-organized and partner-accessible research-focused clinical trials infrastructure. Organized within the framework of an AP4 Center, these applied technology-focused resources would offer the proposed AP4 Centers researchers, in collaboration with outside partners, the ability to rapidly test and refine new biologics from early pre-clinical development through the clinical trials process. An AP4 Center at the COH would be an extension of our ongoing strategic mission to increase the contribution of scholarly research in the co-development of emerging therapeutic technologies. Thus the proposed Center will focus on cellular and immuno-therapeutics because of the interests expressed by our prospective Center partners and because of City of Hopes long-standing and extensive expertise in this field. Some of today's most promising new therapeutic opportunities lie in immunotherapy, including antibody and cellular technologies. COH's existing and developing collaborative activities with biopharmaceutical companies in these areas will serve as the basis for recruiting Members to the Center Partnership.
