UMass Boston

The Center for Personalized Cancer Therapy (CPCT) is a joint program of the University of Massachusetts Boston and the Dana Farber/Harvard Cancer Center (DF/HCC).

The Mission of the Center is to:

1. Build capacity and research infrastructure for use by students and faculty as well as small/startup biotechs.
2. Function as an academic/industry hybrid to develop oncology-related therapeutics and biomarkers with significant clinical utility.
3. Contribute to workforce development in the Commonwealth to increase diversity in the local Life Sciences Cluster and increase the competitiveness of University of Massachusetts Boston students so they will become the future leaders of life sciences research in academia and industry. 

A scientific focus of the center is cancer health disparities research.  The National Cancer Institute (NCI) defines "cancer health disparities" as adverse differences in cancer incidence (new cases), cancer prevalence (all existing cases), cancer death (mortality), cancer survivorship, and burden of cancer or related health conditions that exist among specific population groups in the United States. The CPCT seeks to understand the pathobiologies that drive cancer health disparities and to apply this knowledge to improve cancer treatment in affected populations.