About our G-COE program
Outline of the program
About 30% of the Japanese population is suffering from allergic diseases. However, only symptomatic therapy is presently available, and no curative therapeutic strategy has yet been developed. In addition, one out of three Japanese people die of cancer.
As more elderly people are afflicted with these diseases, the development of low invasive treatments which enable such patients to obtain a good QOL is desired. Allergic diseases and cancer have the common etiological characteristic that is thought to be the dysregulation and malfunction of the immune system operation in the body. To date, concerning the pathogenic mechanism of these diseases, immunological study has produced remarkable achievements on the molecular and genetic level. As a result, we have now reached the stage for the development of new therapeutic strategies based on "immune system regulation" perspectives. Hence, this program focuses on creating an internationally unprecedented excellent center for education and research, in therapeutics based on immune system regulation, in order to promote therapeutic research for intractable immune disorders including allergy, cancer, cardiovascular inflammatory diseases and arteriosclerosis. In addition, this program aims to foster the development of young scientists in the field of therapeutic research, who have the abilities to, 1. Accomplish creative research from new perspectives, 2. Conduct comprehensive clinical research on allergy and an interdisciplinary clinical research on cancer and 3. Play an active role in the global scientific community after obtaining integrated knowledge and methodology on immune system regulation and immunological treatment.
The clinical application of the basic research results will be conducted mainly at the Chiba University Hospital Clinical Research Center and Center for Advanced Medicine. Since 2007, in recognition of its distinguished achievement, Chiba University Hospital has been designated to be a core hospital for the clinical research (one of only about ten hospitals in Japan) by the Japanese government. In cooperation with RCAI (Riken Research Center for Allergy and Immunology) which jointly implements this program, translational research will be strongly promoted, not only in educational aspects, but also for the practical application of new methods of treatment for allergy.
Chiba University and RCAI (Riken Research Center for Allergy and Immunology) have collaborated under an agreement made in 2007 to strengthen bilateral relations. Expansion of this relationship will accelerate the training of graduate school students and young researchers in Chiba University. NIRS, National Institute of Radiological Sciences is the No. 1 research institute in the world for highly advanced cancer therapy using heavy ion charged particle beams, and it has promoted the 21st COE Program in close collaboration with Chiba University. This program, with such collaboration, intends to carry out research and develop new low invasive cancer therapies combining heavy ion charged particle therapy with immune cell therapy, which has never yet been attempted in the world, and also promote and nurture the young human resources involved with this new approach.
