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The International Cancer Genome Consortium (ICGC) has published* its plan to decode the genomes from 25,000 cancer samples and create a resource of freely available data.

As the UK?s arm of the ICGC, the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute will decode hundreds of breast cancer genomes.

Studies of breast, liver, and pancreatic cancer have already generated datasets which are now available on the ICGC website. In a study published last year, the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute made available the results of the first detailed search for genomic rearrangements in breast cancer genomes and complete genome sequences of a melanoma and small cell lung cancer.

Other analyses of tumours conducted by ICGC members in Japan (liver cancer) and Australia and Canada (pancreatic cancer) have also been made available. The data are housed in the Data Coordination Center, which is hosted by the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research in Toronto.

All consortium participants have agreed not to file any patent applications or make other intellectual property claims on primary data from ICGC projects.

Worldwide, more than 7.5 million people died of cancer and more than 12 million new cases of cancer were diagnosed in 2007. Unless progress is made in understanding and controlling cancer, those numbers are expected to rise to 17.5 million deaths and 27 million new cases by 2050.

For further information visit:www.nature.com/nature/journal/v464/n7291/full/nature08987.html