Cancer research is central to our centre's activities and the diverse expertise of our centre members, including genetics, biology, social and population science, health care delivery, diagnostics, bioinformatics and artificial intelligence are applied across multiple cancer related projects. Our members are also participating in a number of cancer related initiatives, for example The Birmingham Experimental Cancer Medicine Centre (ECMC).
Indicative areas of cancer related areas of research include:
I. Cancer Health Data Science
Example areas:
1. Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning in Cancer Research
2. Multimodal cancer related data harmonisation, interoperability, integration and analysis
3. Translational cancer phenomics
II. Omics/clinical bioinformatics
Development of cutting-edge novel cancer bioinformatics approaches and analysis pipelines For example:
- Microbiome-based cancer diagnostics using AI based approaches
- Utilizing deconvolution algorithms to comprehend the immune microenvironment
- Identifying diagnostic markers for early risk stratification
III. Cancer Population Genetics/Genomics
We aim to address the issue of ethnic minority underrepresentation in pharmacogenomic studies, which contributes to global health disparities. Specifically, we focus on assessing the efficacy of cancer treatments in different ethnic groups in the UK, with a particular interest in the genetic ancestry of the population and its association with treatment outcomes. By combining our expertise in genomics and artificial intelligence, we aim to develop more personalized and precise treatment plans that are effective in treating cancer across all populations.