Europe’s top cancer research agency locates new facility at UCD

5 Dec 2013

Top European research agency the Cancer Systems Biology Research group has opened a new facility at UCD to advanced personalised medicine and targeted cancer treatment.

The new group Systems Biology Ireland combines the power of computers and modern biology to understand diseases such as cancer and develops diagnostics and therapies that are tailored to the individual patient. Finding the right drug for the right patient is a major problem, especially in cancer therapy where often only one third of patients respond to treatment.

The goal of Systems Biology Ireland’s research is to double the number of patients that cancer drugs work for by 2020.

“To really take advantage of the new drugs becoming available for targeted therapies, we urgently need the telescopic sights that will allow us to take each patient’s cancer into the crosshairs individually. Systems Biology Ireland is developing these sights,” said Walter Kolch, director of Systems Biology Ireland.

Later this morning Áine Lawlor of RTE will chair a discussion between the leading academic researcher and commercial entrepreneur in this exciting new sector. Denis Noble, Emeritus professor of physiology at Oxford and the first researcher to map and build a virtual human heart will join Linda Avey, who as the founder of both Curious Labs inc and 23andMe is a leader in commercially led research.

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years

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