The International Lung Cancer Consortium (ILCCO)
The International Lung Cancer Consortium (ILCCO) was founded in 2004 by a group of lung cancer researchers from around the world with the aim of compiling comparable data from ongoing epidemiological studies of the lung.
The aim is to increase statistical power, especially in subgroup analyses, avoid the duplication of research efforts, replicate new results, and achieve substantial cost savings through collaborative projects.
The consortium coordinates the genotyping of individual genetic variants and conducts collaborative genome-wide studies. Questionnaire data from tens of thousands of case-control pairs in participating case-control studies from different countries and ethnic populations as well as biomaterial from the majority of all study participants are available to all consortium members.
The Department participates with data from the German Lung Cancer Study and is involved in numerous collaborative projects. Heike Bickeböller has once again been working as a member of the steering committee since 2021.
Coordinator: Dr. Rayjean J. Hung, Samuel Lunenfeld Research Department, Toronto, Canada
Integrative Analysis of Lung Cancer Etiology and Risk (INTEGRAL)
INTEGRAL, and previously TRICL (Transdisciplinary Research in Cancer of the Lung), are projects funded by the NIH involving a group of lung cancer researchers from around the world, established in 2010, and of course continuously renewed with young scientists. The scientific objectives are also changing. Identification of genetic variants relevant to lung cancer, replication in different ethnic populations, proof of a functionally explainable mechanism of action, and risk modelling are among the goals.
The Department of Genetic Epidemiology is active in the “Biostatistics Core”, and in particular in Area 1, i.e. in the identification of genetic variants relevant to lung cancer. In this context, genome-wide investigations from different studies are analysed jointly and supplemented by the detailed typing of narrower genetic regions.
With this aim, the Department develops new methods and optimises existing methods for "gene set analysis", as well as performs such data analyses. Gene-environment interactions are also in focus (see also lung cancer and radon). The Department also participates with data from the German Lung Cancer Study.
Coordinator: Dr. Christopher I. Amos, Dartmouth Geiselmed School of Medicine
Lung Cancer and Radon
The Institute of Genetic Epidemiology at UMG has been cooperating with the Federal Office for Radiation Protection (BfS) for many years. Natural radiation, primarily caused by radon, is viewed the second most important cause of lung cancer. The risk of developing radon-induced lung cancer is low for the individual. However, radon is a component of the air taken in with every breath. Thus, the lifetime risk varies depending on exposure and sensitivity to radiation. An individual’s capacity to repair DNA damage is a key issue in the discussion on the incidence of lung cancer.
At the BfS, DNA from blood samples of lung cancer patients and close relatives, as well as from cancer-free control subjects, was artificially irradiated in 11,043 individual experiments to determine the DNA repair capacity, i.e. the independent repair of the damage by the cells. We demonstrated that DNA repair capacity is a potential predictor of lung cancer at a young age, and has quite high heritability even without artificial irradiation. We then compared the genetic information of miners with extreme occupational radon exposure who developed lung cancer with that of a large cohort of cancer-free individuals. This allowed us to identify a number of genes that might influence individual susceptibility to radon-induced lung cancer. We are working on the validation of these results.
In a project independent of the BfS, we are trying to decipher the molecular-biological mechanisms of indoor radon exposure, to which everyone is exposed at far lower doses.
Contact Person: Mag. Albert Rosenberger
The German Lung Cancer Study
The sample of the German Lung Cancer Study was composed of subsamples from three independent German studies. A total of 506 lung cancer patients (LUCY study: n=305, Heidelberg Lung Cancer Case-Control Study: n=201) were compared with 480 lung-cancer-free control subjects from the population (from the KORA study). Genetic variants relevant to lung cancer were sought across the entire genome.
The German Lung Cancer Study has long since been completed. However, it continues to be involved in numerous international collaborative projects (ILCCO, INTEGRAL). The PIs are Prof. HE Wichmann, Prof. Angela Risch, and Prof. Heike Bickeböller.
LUCY (Lung Cancer in the Young) Study
Lung cancer up to the age of 50. In the LUCY Study, data and materials were collected from lung cancer patients aged up to 50 years and their relatives on a multicentre basis until 2011. It was conducted jointly by the Institute of Epidemiology of Helmholtz Munich and the Department of Genetic Epidemiology, University Medical Centre Göttingen.
In the LUCY study, clinical and molecular biological information, medical history, family history of cancer, education and smoking, as well as blood samples were collected from 847 lung cancer patients diagnosed up to the age of 50, and 5,524 family members. DNA was obtained from blood samples and lymphoblastoid cell lines were cultured.
Heidelberg Lung Cancer Case-Control Study
Within the framework of a case-control study at the Thorax Clinic in Heidelberg the German Cancer Research Centre DKFZ examined and interviewed more than 2000 lung cancer patients. Among them were 300 lung cancer patients who developed the disease up to the age of 50 and about 750 comparable lung-cancer-free control subjects. Information on occupation and education, tobacco smoking, and in a subgroup also on family history of lung cancer, was collected via questionnaire. Blood samples were taken to obtain DNA for genetic testing.
The KORA Study (PI HE Wichmann)
Helmholtz Zentrum München (now Helmholtz Munich) led the KORA study (Cooperative Health Research in the Augsburg Region), which examined the health of thousands of citizens from the Augsburg area to investigate the effects of environmental factors, behaviour, and genes. Four surveys in total were conducted during the period of 1984/85-1999/2001, with a total of 18,000 participants aged between 25 and 74 years. A variety of phenotypic, medical, and laboratory data were collected, and DNA was obtained from blood samples from 16,000 study participants. Epstein-Barr virus immortalised cell lines were also cultured from 1,600 blood samples.
KORA continues to be considered as a representative sample of the population in Germany recognised for genetic use.
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