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>> Science has made great progress in recent years
in understanding cancer.
We now know it's not just one disease.
Instead there are many different cancers.
Each a distinct disease
that involves uncontrolled cell growth, the formation of tumors,
and life threatening consequences.
Cancer is a disease of the genes.
Genes that cause cancer are called "oncogenes."
Among these genetic drivers of cancer, one group stands
out as the most dangerous of them all.
Even the most powerful of modern treatments cannot slow it down.
>> And that's the Ras family of proteins.
When they are tripped into an oncogenic state,
then those Ras proteins, the mutated Ras proteins,
drive an aggressive range
of cancers including pancreatic cancers lung cancers,
colorectal cancers for which there is no effective therapy.
>> The Frederick National Laboratory
for Cancer Research is charting a new course.
It has become more ambitious in its fight against cancer.
Aggressively reaching out to form new collaborations
in research and developments across all sectors.
And it is knocking down barriers to progress.
Now, the time is right to take on Ras-driven cancers.
>> Working with the NCI Frederick advisory committee Dr.
Herald Varmus, the director of the NCI, worked with a number
of academic, commercial, and other government laboratories
as well as Frederick National Lab scientists
to help identify an appropriate new mission for us to challenge.
>> The Frederick National Laboratory has engaged a
national expert in the field of Ras, Dr. Frank McCormick
to lead this major undertaking.
>> We've just recently opened
up a brand new advanced technology research facility
located just outside the campus here on Fort Detrick
which provides 330,000 square feet of state
of the art research
and biologics manufacturing capability.
>> Ras proteins are part of a finely-tuned network of signals
that control growth in human cells.
The network is far more complex than scientists first realized.
They have been studying Ras for many years
and still have not figured out how to make a drug
or other therapy that works.
The United States government created the national laboratory
system specifically to take on problems of this magnitude.
>> So, the mission has been given to us
to attack Ras-driven cancers.
This is not just a very big challenge, a grand challenge,
but it is also the first mission so it's doubly important for us
in the Frederick National Lab.
>> Now, the Frederick National Laboratory is stepping
up to the plate and it's asking everyone who is studying Ras,
whether you're from a drug company or a university
or a nonprofit research organization,
to join in the effort.
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