The San Antonio 1000 Cancer Genomes Project (SA1kCGP), Shanghai-based WuXi NextCODE and South Texas Accelerated Research Therapeutics (START) have partnered to enable San Antonio’s pioneering citywide cancer genomics effort to contribute directly to improving the clinical treatment of cancer around the globe. The SA1kCGP brings together hundreds of doctors, oncologists and surgeons, and a thousand patients to create the basis for the resource: tumor samples from breast, lung, prostate, skin, colorectal, uterine, pancreatic, ovarian, stomach, brain cancers, collected at the time of diagnosis.

START, which operates a phase I medical oncology program through clinical sites in the U.S., China and Spain, has contracted with WuXi NextCODE, a precision medicine company using the genome to improve health worldwide, to sequence and interpret the samples. WuXi NextCODE will utilize its CLIA sequence laboratory and its HIPAA-compliant NextCLOUD secondary analysis and storage solution, powered by DNAnexus. START is connecting the “delta file” to anonymized patient electronic clinical records using the Medidata Rave system, and will make it available to qualified researchers and clinicians via the cloud.

“Our three organizations share the mission of using our unique capabilities and assets to create better medicine for patients everywhere,” said Dr. Anthony Tolcher, director of clinical research at START. “WuXi NextCODE was the logical partner in genomics. They bring to this project the same expertise they are deploying in large-scale precision oncology initiatives from Genomics England to Qatar, backed by the renowned clinical development capabilities of WuXi AppTec.”