Yunnan Provincial Key Laboratory of Lung Cancer was established by the People's Government of Yunnan Province in 2013. As an internal organization of the Third Affiliated Hospital of Kunming Medical University (Yunnan Cancer Hospital, refer to the same entity), Yunnan Provincial Key Laboratory of Lung Cancer has the capacity to perform integrated lung cancer research, teaching and clinical translational research, it is also a center for lung cancer prevention and treatment research, personnel training and academic exchange.
Under the general management of Yunnan Science and Technology Department, the laboratory implements the laboratory director responsibility system while under the leadership of the hospital, and it runs in a strict compliance with the "Yunnan Provincial Key Laboratory Management Measures". The director of the laboratory is Professor Huang Yunchao, professor（Tier 2）, doctoral supervisor and director of the Third Affiliated Hospital of Kunming Medical University (Yunnan Cancer Hospital) and director of Yunnan Cancer Center.
On the basis of the laboratory, it has supported the establishment of "Translational Research Laboratory of Yunnan Cancer Hospital, State Key Laboratory of Molecular Oncology", "Demonstration Laboratory of Molecular Detection of Pathology Quality Control and Evaluation Center of National Health Commission of the People's Republic of China(PQCC)", "Yunnan Provincial Molecular Pathology Base for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Lung Cancer", "Chen Jie Academician Workstation of Canada", "Zhan Qimin Academician Workstation", and "Lung Nodules - Integrated Diagnosis and Treatment Center for Lung Cancer”, “Yunnan Tumor Molecular Gene Center”, “Yunnan Tumor Precision Diagnosis and Treatment Engineering Research Center” and “Yunnan Tumor Biobank”s. In 2014, it is authorized by certificate of "Clinical Gene Amplification Laboratory", and join the tests European Inter-Laboratory Quality Assessment (EMQN) and the Clinical Laboratory Quality Assessment (EQA) of the National Health Commission of the People's Republic of China and the Pathology Quality Control Inter-Laboratory Quality Assessment (PQCC) of the National Health and Family Planning Commission.
The laboratory has an advantageous lung cancer research team composed of professors/associate professors and doctors/masters: there are 26 researchers, 3 technicians, 1 administrative officer, including 7 professors, 10 associate professors, 8 doctoral supervisors, 12 master supervisors. And 10-15 doctoral students, 35-40 master students are cultivated every year.
In view of the severe situation of high incidence of lung cancer, the laboratory has set up a number of research bases and lung cancer monitoring stations in hospitals of counties and towns in Yunnan Province. Focusing on the four directions of "Research on pathogenesis and comprehensive prevention of high-incidence lung cancer", "Research on Environmental Epidemiology of High-incidence Lung Cancer in Yunnan", "Research on individualized comprehensive prevention and treatment based on molecular Markers" and "Research on clinical translational medicine", the Institute is committed to carrying out high-level basic research and applied basic research, and stabilizing, attracting, cultivating and gathering excellent technical talents of lung cancer. It gathers a high-level disciplinary research team and provides important support for the early prevention, early diagnosis and early treatment of lung cancer in Yunnan to reduce the incidence and mortality of lung cancer. It also provides conditions for the establishment of a domestic and foreign exchange platform in the field of lung cancer research in our province and the cultivation of high-quality professionals in the field of lung cancer prevention and treatment. It provides a scientific basis for the formulation of lung cancer prevention and treatment strategies, measures and means in line with the actual situation in Yunnan, and for the government's relevant environmental control, medical resource allocation and other decisions.
The laboratory has a construction area of 1300 m2, with clinical gene amplification laboratory, lung cancer biobank, lung cancer pharmacology laboratory, lung cancer immunology laboratory, lung cancer biotherapy laboratory, lung cancer pathology laboratory, lung cancer epidemiology laboratory, archives management room and study room function area. It has built a number of experimental platforms including cell culture platform, molecular biology basic experiment platform, clinical gene detection platform, high-throughput sequencing platform, biological sample’s information management platform, immunology detection platform and pharmacological research platform. It has a first-generation gene sequencer, second-generation high-throughput gene sequencer, third-generation long-read gene sequencer, digital PCR instrument, micro-cutting system, SCIEX QTRAP mass spectrometer, super-speed centrifuge, real-time quantitative gene amplification instrument, biological analyzer, high-performance liquid chromatography, supercomputer and micro confocal microscope and other experimental equipment worth 30 million yuan. It has entered the "Yunnan Province Large-scale Instruments and Equipment Open and Sharing Management Platform", which is open to research institutions inside and outside the province. By October 2022, the laboratory information biological sample management platform had 21 lung cancer cell lines; 22,067 lung cancer patients’ biological samples (tissue, serum, plasma, thoracoabdominal fluid, etc.;), biological samples of 5689 patients with lung benign lesions; The peripheral blood samples of 8800 healthy people provide rich resources for the basic and translational research of lung cancer.
Since its establishment, the laboratory has been committed to the systematic research of lung cancer with high incidence. With 2 projects, 1 sub-project has been funded by the National Key research project of Ministry of Science and Technology, 1 key project funded by the National Natural Science Foundation, and the lab has 31 Natural Science Foundation projects, 73 provincial and ministerial scientific research funds. At the same time, it undertook the work of "Early diagnosis and treatment program of lung cancer in rural areas nationwide" and "Early diagnosis and treatment of lung cancer in urban areas of Ministry of Health" in Yunnan Province. The research achievements have been awarded 2 special prizes and 2 first prizes of Yunnan Provincial Science and Technology Progress; larger amount of papers have been published in the Lancet Oncology, Lancet Respiratory Medicine, Nature Communications, National Science Review, Molecular Cancer, and Cancer letters etc.; and participated in the compilation of Lung Surgery, 2007 Chinese Clinical Guidelines for Lung Cancer and 2010 Chinese Clinical Guidelines for Lung Cancer by the research team. At present, the laboratory has established the gene mutation detection system and the risk assessment system of lung cancer susceptibility. The individual treatment of lung cancer guided by molecular marker detection of EGFR, EMLA4-ALK, KRAS, NRAS, PIK3CA, BRAF C-kit/PDGFRA, Her2, and chemotherapeutic drug related gene expression and gene polymorphism and liquid biopsy (peripheral blood circulating tumor cells and circulating ctDNA) can be carried out. At the same time, a number of international multi-center clinical drug trials and clinical trials of personalized novel molecular diagnostic kits for lung cancer have been conducted here.
The laboratory has established long-term cooperative relations with the American Cancer Institute (NCI), Humboldt University in Germany, MD Anderson Cancer Center in the United States, Vienna General Hospital in Austria and the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Together with partners, the lab jointly applied for a number of international cooperation projects such as "Hospital-based Case-control Study" funded by Yunnan Innovation-Strong Province Special and International cooperation Program and National Natural Science Foundation-Hong Kong Joint Foundation. In cooperation with the University of Alberta, Canada, two organizations have jointly developed portable mobile diagnostic testing equipment of molecular markers and nanotechnology for lung cancer. Prof. Huang, director of the laboratory was invited to give special reports in foreign academic exchange conferences such as the 12th World Lung Cancer Congress, the 13th World Lung Cancer Congress and the 18th European Academic Conference on Thoracic Surgery many times, which brought the regional high incidence of lung cancer in Yunnan Province to the attention at home and abroad, and played a positive role in promoting the development of lung cancer prevention and treatment in our province.
The laboratory attaches great importance to social service and is open to the public. The "Open Research Fund" is set up every year to attract scholars engaged in lung cancer research at home and abroad to work in the laboratory. As a sub-venue of the "Laboratory Open Day of the Chinese Society of Cell Biology", the laboratory receives 300-500 middle school students and college students to visit and study in the laboratory every year. What’s more, the lab conduct popular science lectures and publicity and education related to lung cancer, which plays a positive role in carrying out public health science education and promoting the dissemination of medical culture.
In order to improve the level of scientific research and clinical prevention of lung cancer in Yunnan Province, the laboratory is following the purpose of "rigorous, practical, open and sharing" and striving to build a high-level key laboratory.