To advance the five key initiatives undertaken by our center since 2021—hospital operations, research projects, clinical research management, biobank initiatives, and cancer control programs—we carried out a major renewal of the Research Institute in 2022. As part of further restructuring to strengthen these initiatives, we established the Molecular Pathology Division in January 2024. This new division bridges clinical and basic research by integrating pathologists who also hold research positions within the institute.

Our Department  of Pathology, which is responsible for direct cancer diagnosis, adopts an organ-specific diagnostic system in which pathologists specialize in specific organs—a somewhat distinctive approach in Japan. This enables our institute to conduct organ-specific cancer research using patient-derived tumor tissues and cell lines and to apply clinical and molecular pathological analyses to develop findings that can be translated back into clinical practice. Additionally, we are utilizing advanced digital technologies and AI-driven deep learning to integrate histopathological findings with macroscopic tumor observations and imaging data, with the ultimate goal of improving cancer treatment outcomes.

Our institute already houses several ongoing projects, including:

The Medical Seeds Discovery Project: establishes patient-derived cancer cell lines to evaluate tumor-suppressive effects and the safety of anticancer drugs.

The Tumor Peptidomics Project: systematically analyzes peptides (proteins with molecular weights less than 10,000) that exhibit anticancer activity in cancer cells, seeking novel diagnostic and therapeutic targets for refractory cancers.

With the addition of the Molecular Pathology Division, we anticipate that pathologists will bring innovative research ideas to the institute through regular clinical-pathological conferences and collaboration with clinicians. This division will serve as a gateway between clinical and basic researchers within our institute while strengthening joint research networks with academia and industry partners across Tochigi Prefecture and Japan. Utilizing the unique advantage of being the only institution in Tochigi with a dedicated Cancer Biobank, we will continue to push forward in translational cancer research aimed at overcoming cancer.

Our mission extends beyond cancer treatment alone. As a comprehensive cancer center, we integrate research and clinical practice on a single campus to advance cancer care—reducing cancer mortality in Tochigi Prefecture and ultimately delivering the benefits of these advances to patients across Japan.

April 2024

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