GENOMICS OF PANCREATIC TUMOURS - WHAT WE NOW KNOW

Each year, over 2500 patients in Australia are diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Pancreatic cancer is one of the most lethal tumour types with a five year survival of just 5%, thus there is a need to find alternative approaches to treatment. In recent years, the application of next generation sequencing has revealed the complex genomic landscape of pancreatic cancer, uncovering the mutation processes that occur during tumour development and has begun to identify new or repurposed therapeutic opportunities for pancreatic cancer patients. The identification of targets for therapy is a crucial goal of the large next generation sequencing studies as we move into an era of targeted or personalised medicine, where drugs will be selected based on the characteristics of a patient's tumour. Due to the large degree of heterogeneity in pancreatic cancer, a personalised approach to treatment seems particularly warranted. This review will summarise some of the key findings from genome sequencing of pancreatic cancer, describing the major driver genes and perturbed pathways, and highlighting some of the new potential and promising therapeutic opportunities that have been uncovered.