A/Prof Ben Tran, Clinical Research Fellow

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I am a medical oncologist who is heavily involved in drug development. I aim to develop better treatments for cancer through laboratory research and clinical trials.

My research focuses on matching people with the best treatment for their individual cancer. In particular, I am studying how the genome of cancer cells interacts with the body’s anti-tumour immune response.

Ultimately my research could lead to better ways of personalising treatment for cancer patients.

Research interest

My research is focused on assessing potential new anti-cancer drugs through early phase clinical trials, mostly in urological cancers.

Some of these drugs are molecularly targeted and require molecular pre-selection of appropriate trial participants through molecular profiling using next generation sequencing.

Other new drugs involve targeting and activating the immune system within individual patients, to generate an anti-cancer effect.

My laboratory-based research is also focused on urological cancers, particularly testicular and bladder cancer.

I am currently working with a multinational team to determine why some testicular cancers do not respond well to chemotherapy.

In bladder cancer, I am working to determine why some patients do not benefit from immunotherapy. This involves the generation and analysis of real world data, together with the use of molecular profiling and gene expression studies to help determine how to get the right drug to the right patient at the right time.

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Selected publications from A/Prof Ben Tran

Templeton AJ, McNamara MG, Šeruga B, Vera-Badillo FE, Aneja P, Ocaña A, Leibowitz-Amit R, Sonpavde G, Knox JJ, Tran B, Tannock IF, Amir E. Prognostic Role of Neutrophil to Lymphocyte Ratio in Solid Tumors: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. J Natl Cancer Inst. 2014 May 29;106(6):dju124. PMID: 24875653

Goldstein J, Tran B, Ensor J, Gibbs P, Wong HL, Wong SF, Vilar E, Tie J, Broaddus R, Kopetz S, Desai J, Overman M. Multicenter retrospective analysis of metastatic colorectal cancer (CRC) with high-level microsatellite instability (MSI-H). Ann Oncol 2014 epub ahead of print PMID 24585723

Richter S, Bedard PL, Chen EX, Clarke B, Tran B, Hotte SJ, Stathis A, Hirte HW, Razak ARA, Reedijk M, Chen Z, Cohen B, Wen-Jiang Z, Wang L, Ivy SP, Moore MJ, Oza AM, Siu LL, McWhirter E. A phase I study of the oral gamma secretase inhibitor RO4929097 in combination with gemcitabine in patients with advanced solid tumors (PHL-078/CTEP 8575). Invest New Drugs 2014;32(2):243-9 PMID 23645447

Tran B, Brown AMK, Bedard PL, Winquist E, Goss GD, Hotte SJ, Welch SA, Hirte HW, Zhang T, Stein LD, Ferretti V, Watt S, Jiao W, Ng K, Ghai S, Shaw P, Petrocelli T, Hudson TJ, Neel BG, Onetto N, Siu LL, McPherson JD, Kamel-Reid S, Dancey JE. Feasibility of Real Time Next Generation Sequencing of Cancer Genes Linked to Drug Response: Results from a Clinical Trial. Int J Can. 2013;132(7):1547-55 PMID 22948899

Tran B, Dancey JE, Kamel-Reid S, McPherson JD, Bedard PL, Brown AMK, Zhang T, Shaw P, Onetto N, Stein L, Hudson TJ, Neel BG, Siu LL. Cancer Genomics: Technology, Discovery and Translation. J Clin Oncol. 2012; 30(6):647-660 PMID 22271477

A/Prof Ben Tran

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