Asia Cohort Consortium

Overview

The Asia Cohort Consortium (ACC), established in November 2004, is a global collaborative study that investigates the relationship between human genetics and environmental exposures in order to understand disease etiology. Measurements of genetic variation, behavior, and environmental exposures help inform this etiology since much of the genetic variation associated with disease risk is dependent upon the presence of environmental variability.

The ACC will enroll and monitor approximately one million healthy people in the Asia-Pacific region over time to attempt to establish a comprehensive pattern of susceptibility and resistance to disease, including cancer. Such a large cohort is necessary to improve the sensitivity of disease detection and determine which protein patterns serve as signals for disease. The ACC will map both the behavioral and environmental characteristics in conjunction with epidemiological studies on disease mortality and morbidity.

The ACC is led by co-chairs John Potter of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center’s Public Health Sciences Division and Keun-Young Yoo of the Korean National Cancer Center. Presently, a coordinating center is being developed at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center to provide support for the ACC’s scientific collaboration, coordination and communication, data operations, and statistical consultation.

Global Collaboration and Meetings

Investigators from China, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, the U.S., and other economies meet on a biannual basis to report on the progress of each economy’s cohort, to discuss issues relevant to the development of common protocol guidelines, and to prepare for collaborative projects. Trainings and meetings for the ACC working groups and Consortium members occur throughout the year. Recent meetings took place in September 2006 in Seoul and April 2007 in Los Angeles. The next meeting is tentatively scheduled for October 2007 in Kuala Lumpur.

Nine working groups established in April 2005 and comprised of representatives from participating economies each examine one of the following issues:

  • diet & nutrition
  • obesity & physical activity
  • occupation & environment
  • medical & reproductive history
  • alcohol & tobacco use
  • family history & genetics
  • biospecimens & sample collection
  • data collection & management
  • follow-up & endpoint ascertainment

Recent Developments

New ACC cohorts—after receiving funding— have begun activities in Korea, Malaysia, and Singapore. Other economies that intend to participate and are still in the development stages for their cohort include: Australia, Canada, China, Japan, Taiwan, Thailand, and the United States. Consortium members who are also principal investigators of previously established cohorts have begun collaborating on a separate study of lifestyle factors (e.g., tobacco and alcohol use) and rare cancers. ACC strategic objectives for this project are twofold:

  • demonstrate the feasibility of data pooling within ACC
  • generate a pooled database for use in future projects