Translational research and innovation department

Research at the Centre Léon Bérard

Introduction

Transfer research is the essential link between basic research, which helps to understand crucial biologic mechanisms leading to tumours, and clinical research which is directly carried out with patients.
The department of transfer research and innovation of the Centre Léon Bérard, ran by Patrick Mehlen, develops multidisciplinary works, from biology to human and social sciences, to surgery or radiotherapy.
1 major objective: speed up scientific findings and their implementation on patients, to get a more and more personalized medicine which can be tailored to different types of tumours, but also to each patient.

6 research teams:

Medical Practice Evaluation – Director Prof Isabelle Ray-Coquard
Radiotherapy team -Créatis, UMR CNRS 5220, Inserm U 1044 - Director David Sarrut.
Genetic polymorphism group - Director David Cox
Experimental surgery Institute - Unité 1032 LabTau – Director Prof Michel Rivoire
Translational Research laboratory - Director Pierre Saintigny
Cancer and environment Unit - Director Dr Béatrice Fervers
Department of Human And Social Sciences - Marc Billaud

4 technology platforms:

Centre for Drug Discovery and Development (C3D) - Director Stéphane Giraud.
Innovation in Immune Monitoring and Immunotherapy (P3I) - Director Christophe Caux
Tumour Model Laboratory - Director Isabelle Godard
Tumour Characterization Platform – coordinated by Pierre Saintigny. This platform includes the Biological Resources Centre, the Cancer Genomics Group, the Gilles-Thomas Bioinformatics Platform, as well as the Anatomical Pathology research group

1 administration and financial unit

Directed by Marina Rousseau Tsangaris, this unit is in charge of the operational organization, the management of large projects, dissemination, administration and financial management.

Open to international participation

The Centre Léon Bérard is entering into specific collaborations with Asia. In 2017, under the aegis of SIRIC, the Center participated in the Franco-Chinese school of oncology in Wuhan and organized a meeting with the Union hospital in Wuhan. It is expected that research projects on common themes will focus specifically on cancers of the breast, the head and the neck, or urological

Drug Discovery and Developmen

New ! The department of human and social sciences

The creation of this department, under the direction of Marc Billaud (CNRS research director), responds to the need to study the current upheavals in cancerology with the rise of precision oncology. The research projects aim to understand how precision oncology, which combines large-scale genomic analysis of cancers, bioinformatics processing of molecular big data and the design of new therapies, is gradually transforming medical practice and the patient-doctor relationship. These different areas of research are integrated into large-scale projects such as LYriCAN and PLAsCAN. Efforts to structure and raise the profile of these themes have made it possible, in collaboration with the École Normale Supérieure de Lyon (ENS), to create a chair of excellence, recruitment for which is planned for 2018.

Did you know ?

Transfer research at the Centre Léon Bérard aims to shape new knowledges of biological mechanisms which are behind the development of a cancer, into concrete implementation in the medical field (new drugs, new diagnostical or prognostical tests, development of surgery equipment, radiotherapy, interventional imaging…).