Unit of Biomarkers and Susceptibility

The Unit of Biomarkers and Susceptibility is part of the Cancer Prevention and Control Program at the Catalan Institute of Oncology (ICO). It is a research group working in the area of discovery and validation of molecular biomarkers in cancer, with interest in diagnosis, prognosis and response to treatment. The Unit also collaborates with other research groups of the institution in projects related to cancer biomarkers.

Its research is focused on genetic epidemiology, molecular diagnosis of cancer, markers in the prognosis and predicting therapeutic response and the identification of new therapeutic targets.

The group is formed by epidemiologists, biologists, bioinformatics, biostatistics, mathematicians, nurses, researchers and documentalists. This multidisciplinary group allow addressing the research projects from a complete perspective. Ww aim to identify diagnostic, therapeutic or predictive biomarkers useful in clinical practice.

To perform this task, we analyze well characterized clinical samples with massive molecular assays and use the latest analytical bioinformatics tools. The Unit was created in 2008 with the name of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics Unit, although there was already a team working under the same conditions within the Department of Epidemiology and Cancer Registry of the ICO. In late 2009 the unit joined the Program of Cancer Prevention and Control, led by Dr. Victor Moreno.