Building 31, Room 10A24
Bethesda, MD 20892

Though many organizations throughout the world fund cancer research, none share a common coding system to describe their research projects, making it difficult on paper to compare or coordinate their research efforts.

But that is about to change. This week, seven organizations involved in cancer research announced that they would join the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command (USAMRMC) in adopting a newly created, standardized coding system. These organizations are: American Cancer Society (Atlanta, Ga.), California Cancer Research Program (Sacramento, Calif.), California Breast Cancer Research Program (Oakland, Calif.), Cancer Research Campaign of the United Kingdom (London, U.K.), CaP CURE (Santa Monica, Calif.), Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation (Dallas, Texas), and Oncology Nursing Society (Pittsburgh, Pa.).

According to Richard Klausner, M.D., director of the NCI, the hope is that even more cancer research organizations will choose in the coming years to implement the new system, called the Common Scientific Outline, or CSO. "The CSO helps to lay a framework for better coordination among research organizations," said Klausner. "It puts everybody on the same page as they evaluate their scientific portfolios, helping to point to areas of possible collaboration and suggesting areas of duplicated or undersupported study."

The CSO, which underwent pilot testing jointly by the NCI and USAMRMC, is designed for easy accessibility to scientists and members of the public. Organized around seven broad areas of scientific interest in cancer research, these categories include: biology; etiology; prevention; early detection, diagnosis, and prognosis; treatment; cancer control, survivorship, and outcomes research; and scientific model systems.

The NCI is now developing a Web-accessible database organized around the CSO system. Expected to be available to the public and research community by the end of the year, this searchable database will provide interested users with a straight-forward way to access and explore NCI-supported research by type of cancer and by scientific area.

For more information about cancer, visit NCI's Web site at http://www.cancer.gov.