Current FCF Research Projects

The following initiatives were funded in 2010.

I. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK), New York

FCF has funded the creation of The Fibrolamellar Consortium. This is a collaborative effort by Memorial Sloan Kettering (NYC), John Hopkins (Baltimore), and University of California/San Francisco. Its mission is to increase awareness of fibrolamellar and to run the first clinical trial of drugs dedicated for patients with non-resectable fibrolamellar hepatocellular carcinoma. The trial is to target the mechanisms of action of the disease. We hope to provide you with more information on this effort before year end.

In June of 2011, the Consortium had a poster presentation at the ASCO convention in Chicago. This generated a lot of interest and queries about fibrolamellar research.

II. Rockefeller University, New York

The Foundation granted Dr. Sandy Simon funds to study immunotherapy vs. fibrolamellar. Rockefeller University has put their full support behind Sandy and, as with MSK, will charge no administrative fees for this research. Whereas MSK's trial goal is life extension, Sandy's goal is finding a cure - total eradication from the body. He feels this path is through the immune system using the patients' own antibodies to track and kill the cancer cells. His research also includes melanoma and breast cancer cells.

Dr. Simon has already discovered a way to extract antibodies from a patient, mark them, and re-introduce them into the body. The marked antibodies can attach to the smallest of cancer cells which will help surgeons and pathologists determine, during surgery, whether all the cancer has been removed.

III. University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, North Carolina

Dr. Lola Reid is working with Tucker's cancer cells to determine where these cells start within the stem cells of the biliary tree. Dr. Reid has found a way to culture Tucker's cells and grow them to provide more cells for other labs' research. She is working with Dr. Abou-Alfa at MSK on running assay studies comparing her cultured cancer cells to Tucker's original tumor cells to determine if they are identical.

IV. Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD

Dr. Michael Torbenson has written the first paper on blood markers for fibrolamellar which was published in the journal, Modern Pathology, in late 2010. The article recognized FCF for their financial support. Dr. Torbenson is presently studying the microRNA of fibrolamellar cells.

V. British Columbia Cancer Center, British Columbia

Dr. Y.Z. Wang successfully implanted Tucker's cancer cells in mice (xenograft). He received these cells from Lola Reid at UNC. As of September 2011, Dr. Wang has received peer-approval for publication of his findings on microRNA research he is doing on cancer. He has thanked FCF for supporting his effort. His findings will help other microRNA researchers who are studying other cancers, ie. Dr. Torbenson at Johns Hopkins University who is studying microRNA of fibrolamellar. Dr. Wang's paper sets an important precedent in cancer research in that it reports discrete molecular (microRNA) differences between tumors which metastasize and perfectly matched tumors that do not. These finding may have diagnostic, prognostic and most important of all, therapeutic implications.