Lung Cancer (2004) 43, 363—365

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Networking for excellence in lung cancer:paper vs. research work

In the Sixth Framework Program of the EuropeanUnion, following an invitation from the EuropeanCommission to submit Networks of Excellence, webegan a process of networking for a purely transla-tional approach to lung cancer, acting as coordina-tors in the area of life sciences, 15 months beforethe deadline for the proposal submission.

Reported herein are the essential numbers (ba-sic statistics and financial data) connected with thiskind of activity involving 30 ‘‘partners’’ and 24 ex-pertises (from genomics to information technology

and public health via clinics), distributed in eightcountries throughout Europe, in the period fromNovember 2001 to February 2003. The process ofnetworking, coordinated by PG was interrupted onemonth prior to the application-submission becausethe newly created network, called The EuropeanLung Cancer Network (ELUCAN) merged with yet an-other one called Imaging and Molecular status ofPatients for Prevention and Clinical Trial on LungCancer,(IMPACT-LC), which was coordinated by Pro-fessor Christian Brambilla, University of Grenoble.So, this particular record keeping was interrupted.Therefore, the network IMPACT-LC has been for-warded for the application.

Number of people actively involved in the coordination 2Average number of month/man engaged: considering a mean

number of 4.5 h/day (range: 0.5—12) for 390 days2.43

Number of text documents (range: 20—2500 characters) created 138Quantity of paper used (A4 format; packs of 500) 6Number of laser printer toner cartridges consumed 3Number of e-mails sent (of which, number of single address mails:

1012, multiple address: 353)1365

Number of e-mails received (of which, as a single recipient: 654,as one of multiple recipients: 111)

765

Quantity of ordinary mail sent 10Quantity of ordinary mail received 7Number of phone calls made (range 30 s to 123min, mean 19min) 743Numbers of phone calls received (range: 20 s to 47min) 244Number of meetings attended (range: 5—23 persons): 19Number of ‘‘one-day’’ trips per person (domestic) 7Number of ‘‘one-day’’ trips per person (international) 5Number of persons contacted ‘‘face-to-face’’ 123Number of kilometres travelled/person (approx.) 16000

Expenses (expressed in Euros)Phone call expenses (10 eurocent/minute) 1411,00Ordinary mail expenses 10,00Travel expenses (domestic) 2130,00Travel expenses (international) 7230,00Airport/railway station commuting 650,00Secretarial activity expenses (paper, toner, etc.) 305,00Overall expenses 11746,00

0169-5002/$ – see front matter © 2003 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.doi:10.1016/j.lungcan.2003.09.007

364 Letter to the Editor

Additional information:

• E-mails have been sent and received by a singlee-mail address, created for this purpose only.

• Telephone calls have been made and receivedby two mobile phone numbers, activated for thispurpose only.

• Secretarial expenses entered as ‘‘ad hoc’’ inven-tory and materials bought for this purpose havebeen stored and used under the co-ordinators’ di-rect supervision.

• Airplane tickets have been booked and boughtunder a ‘‘best fare possible’’ basis. For practi-cal purposes and availability of flights with some-times very short notice no ‘‘low cost’’ companieshave been used.

• Unrecorded actions and expenses can be consid-ered as marginal.

1. Comment

Ideally, translational research (TR) is defined asthe process of translating findings derived in basicscience to the development of new understandingof disease mechanism, diagnosis and therapeutics.It implies a bi-directional process, as it utilizesknowledge of human biology to develop and testthe feasibility of cancer-relevant interventions inhumans and/or determines the biological basis forobservations made in individuals with cancer orin populations at risk for cancer. In oncologicalsettings, TR is usually implemented by creating a‘‘functional’’ bridge between scientists working inthe field of basic research and researchers involvedin the early phases (phases I—II) of clinical researchthrough ad hoc collaborative efforts. Small butmulti-disciplinary teams are assembled, and eachmember’s contribution is based on individual skills.

The shared efforts of researchers from both thebasic and research fields have the objective ofidentifying (namely, to select) as soon as possibleduring the research and development (R&D) pro-cess, effective health interventions (here used inits broadest sense to indicate molecular assays,imaging techniques, drugs and/or biological prod-ucts) using a combination of pre-clinical and clin-ical measures. Candidates’ interventions are thenfurther tested, in a later and confirmative phase ofthe clinical research (namely, phase III) by compar-ing the new health interventions versus appropriatecomparators, such as placebo, best supportive careor well-established active treatments, in terms ofsafety and efficacy measures to ensure that thebenefits of new drugs outweigh their risks.

TR is most likely to be successful when it is car-ried out in a matrix of basic, clinical, and populationactivities where scientists from several but corre-lated disciplines work together in pre-planned andintegrated projects.

In the USA, ad hoc funding programs have beenrecently launched by the NCI to conduct early-stageinterventions which have the goal of establishingthe feasibility or the proof of concept of specifictranslational approaches in several types of cancer(http://www.spores.nci.nih.gov). In Europe, thenew VI Framework Program has the very objectiveof sustaining and enhancing the collaboration ofthe European Centres of Excellence in several crit-ical research areas, such as genomics and biotech-nology for health (http://www.cordis.lu/fp6/eoi-instruments). Still we have only 4% of the memberstates’ deposits (funds) re-directed for researchpurposes at the European level, with the obviousconsequence of a disproportionate ratio betweengrant applications and projects that can be effec-tively funded.

The reported evidences may be of help in an un-derstanding of the commitment which is necessarywhen such an involved process of networking is atstake.

In addition, incisive affirmative actions should betakenwith urgency, through appropriate incentives,in order to have the new generations on the pathof academic and research careers, developing at aEuropean, rather than at a national level.

If, having read this short report, one still desiresto take such an initiative, one might consider thefollowing three closing figures: number of timesthe words ‘‘money’’ + ‘‘financing’’ + ‘‘fund’’ ap-peared in all the documents exchanged: 3456;number of times the word ‘‘please’’ appeared inthe documents sent by the coordination: 1012;number of times the phrase ‘‘thank you’’ appearedin the documents received by the coordination:36.

Alfredo Cesarioa,∗Stefano Margaritoraa

Silvio Parodi b,c

Patrizia Russob

Carlo La Vecchiad

Giovanni Apoloned

Domenico Galettaa

Francesco Pezzellae

Pierluigi Granonea

aDivision of General Thoracic SurgeryCatholic University, Largo A. Gemelli

00168 Rome, ItalybExperimental Oncology Unit

Oncogenesis Department

365

National Institute for Research on CancerGenoa, Italy

cExperimental Oncology UnitUniversity of GenoaDOBIG, Genoa, Italy

dMario Negri Institute forPharmacological Research

Milan, Italy

eCancer Research UK Tumour Pathology GroupNuffield Department of Clinical LaboratoryScience, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK

∗Corresponding author. Tel.: +39-335-8366161fax: +39-06-3051162

E-mail address: alfcesario@rm.unicatt.it(A. Cesario)

7 August 2003