Japan’s Cross-border Collaborations are Making a Difference in the Fight Against Cancer

“In the past, drug and treatment development was based on cooperation with a single, large-scale company,” explains Dr. Hitoshi Nakagama, President of the NCC, “more recently, however, the seeds of medical innovation have come from multiple institutions and companies. Collaborations now need an international perspective to accelerate development, which is why we are working together with JETRO.”

Early detection of cancer is one of the most important factors in maximizing the chance of long-term survival. This is especially true with cancers such as breast cancer, in which most cases are still detected through cancer screening. Currently, radiologists must examine each mammography X-ray, a slow and difficult process as they avoid missing potential tumors or prescribing surgeries that turn out to be unnecessary. Singapore-based FathomX has been developing artificial intelligence systems to detect early tumor development and to take over some of the functions that used to require a radiologist’s time. “Detecting tumors is a very taxing job for the radiologist,” says FathomX CEO Stephen Lim, “so what our AI tool does is provide a heat map that identifies the areas of concern and provides a probability score to estimate the chance of cancer.” FathomX is, working together with NCC and other hospitals in Japan, as well as medical facilities in other nations throughout the Asia-Pacific. By testing their AI tools with as wide a patient base as possible to improve accuracy and efficacy, NCC hope to have it ready for general use. “NCC is committed to provide the best possible cancer treatment and care,” says Mr. Lim, “which is in line with our objectives of introduction our technology to the world. Hence, we knew that NCC will be a good collaboration partner.”

From NCC’s perspective, the collaboration has the potential to produce positive results not just in enhancing their own diagnostic results, but in improving the state of breast cancer diagnosis as a whole. “While we were impressed with FathomX’s technological capabilities, and were happy to collaborate with them as their research is in line with our philosophy,” says Dr. Tatsuya Onishi of NCC, “I also think that the development of medical devices should not be based solely on Japanese data, as this risks a Galapagos effect [in which technologies are so over-specialized to the needs of a particular market that they cannot be used elsewhere]. From global perspective, Japan may not be a very large market, but through research projects like this we can use Japanese data to improve global technological capabilities. This is a great benefit for us.”

Spain-based Arjuna Therapeutics is exploring the potential of a new type of drug, called Ag5, that may be effective in dealing with forms of cancer considered the deadliest and most aggressive, including esophageal, gastric, and ovarian. A complicating factor of cancer treatment is that each type grows, spreads, responds to treatment in a unique way. The concept behind Ag5’s effectiveness is that the most aggressive cancers have a very high energy consumption level. The drug is therefore designed to attack the energy production pathways in the cells’ mitochondria, starving and killing the cancer cells while leaving non-cancerous cells largely unharmed. If successful, this would theoretically allow these cancers to be effectively treated while avoiding the often-debilitating side effects of traditional chemotherapy, enabling patients to maintain more of their normal lifestyles during treatment.

At the moment, Arjuna is the only team developing this particular type of drug. Currently, Arjuna and NCC are working together to test the effectiveness of Ag5 in the lab, using tumors removed from Japanese patients. “A significant number of the cancers that are potentially treatable by Ag5 also have a high incidence rate in Japan. NCC is a world-class cancer institute with deep expertise in these cancers,” says Dr. Ross Breckenridge, CEO of Arjuna. “Interestingly, many of these cancers are rare outside of Japan, Korea and China, so it would be very difficult for us to conduct clinical trials in Europe.”

For NCC, these trials are a fantastic opportunity, and not just for the benefits that a drug like Ag5 would provide to patients if successful. “Arjuna is developing a very unique technology, and we have the chance to combine that with our world-class drug-discovery program, so of course we were interested in working with them, but this is not our only goal,” says Dr. Akihiro Ohashi of NCC, who is working with Arjuna. “Our ultimate goal is to create epoch-making drugs that are not yet available anywhere in the world, and provide to patients suffering from cancer as quickly as possible. Therefore, we want more companies to see the expertise we have available here and come to conduct research in Japan, especially with NCC, so that we may become a hub for drug discovery.

According to Enlipsium, the new technology, which currently being tested in a collaboration with NCC, will enable image resolutions 100 times better than existing devices, while also enabling faster use and lower operating costs. “NCC Japan is well known for its high standards and is at the forefront of Radiation Therapy practices worldwide,” says Mr. Yzhar Perry, CEO of Enlipsium. “Therefore, we believe it is a perfect partner to further develop our high-performance dosimetry solutions, especially in fields of Proton Therapy.”

The international partnerships being facilitated by JETRO aren’t limited to private corporations working with NCC. In the United States, the Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research performs a very similar role there as NCC’s research division does in Japan, developing new technologies and collaborating with public, private, and academic research teams around the world. Working together with NCC’s Exploratory Oncology Research & Clinical Trial Center (EPOC) the two institutions began an AI-based drug discovery project in 2021, using artificial intelligence to explore new potential cancer treatments. “NCC-EPOC was the perfect peer organization to advance cancer research together. Without all the collective groundwork in JETRO, NCC-EPOC, and FNLCR, this partnership didn’t happen,” said Dr. Eric Stahlberg, Director of the Cancer Data Science Initiative at FNLCR.