Dr Darragh O’Brien from the Centre for Medicines Discovery will co-lead a major UK study together with Professor Anthony Maraveyas and Dr Leonid Nikitenko from the University of Hull, aimed at transforming the early detection of pancreatic cancer. Building on the team's discovery of ASSIGN-1, a patented protein signature capable of identifying pancreatic cysts at the highest risk of progressing to cancer, the project will validate this promising approach in a multicentre cohort involving patients from Hull, London, Glasgow and other participating sites. The researchers will investigate whether ASSIGN-1 can accurately predict cancer risk using pancreatic cyst fluid and, crucially, whether the same signature can also be detected in blood, paving the way for a simple, minimally invasive diagnostic test.
The research addresses a critical unmet clinical need. Current diagnostic tests cannot reliably distinguish high-risk pancreatic cysts from benign lesions, meaning some patients undergo unnecessary surgery while others are diagnosed only after their cancer has advanced. By enabling clinicians to identify patients at greatest risk much earlier, ASSIGN-1 has the potential to shift pancreatic cancer diagnosis towards earlier intervention, when treatment is most effective. If successful, the biomarker panel could improve risk stratification, reduce avoidable operations, support the long-term monitoring of low-risk cysts, and ultimately improve patient survival.
The multidisciplinary consortium brings together experts from Hull, Glasgow, London and Oxford, and has been developed in close partnership with patient partners, Cancer Research Horizons, and Pancreatic Cancer UK. At Oxford, Dr O’Brien will work alongside fellow CMD researchers Professor Benedikt Kessler, Dr Phillip Charles and Dr Iolanda Vendrell from the Discovery Proteomics Facility to advance the proteomics underpinning this next generation of early detection tools.